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DG 315 .C64 1914

Coleman, Christopher Bush,

1875-1944.
Constantine the Great and
Christianity

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CONSTANTINE THE GREAT AND CHRISTIANITY

STUDIES IN HISTORY, ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC LAW

EDITED BY THE FACULTY OF POLITICAL SCIENCE OF
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

Volume LX] [Number 1

Whole Number 146

CONSTANTINE THE GREAT
AND CHRISTIANITY

THREE PHASES: THE HISTORICAL, THE LEGENDARY,
AND THE SPURIOUS

CHRISTOPHER BUSH 'cOLEMAN, Ph.D.,

Professor of History, Butler College^ Indianapolis, Ind.

IXm Dork

THE COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS

LONGMANS, GREEN & CO., AGENTS
London: P. S. King & Scn
1914

CHRISTOPHER BUSH COLEMAN

PREFACE

If any defense is necessary for discussing to-day not
only the Constantine of history but also the historic
ghost of Constantine, i. e., the legends and the forgery
which later times produced in his name, it can be found
in the fact that starting at one time with a study of the
religious revolution which centered in Constantine, and
at another with the "Donation of Constantine," forged
in the eighth century, I found myself in both instances
without any logical stopping-place short of a considera-
tion of the whole field. If in the present work parts of
this field are somewhat imperfectly covered, it is my
hope that these imperfections may not too seriously
impeach the soundness of this procedure. Even the
brief summary herein given of the modern critical study
of Constantine and Constantinian legends furnishes, in
contrast with the early medieval accounts of the emperor,
an interesting illustration of the revolution wrought by
the modern, scientific-historical spirit. It gains peculiar
interest when one considers that Constantine was perhaps
the greatest promoter of that other revolution, in which
the Christian church gained the mastery of the Roman and
Medieval mind, and that the Constantinian legends were
among the notable products of the type of piety long
promoted by that church. Two of the greatest revolu-
tions in European history thus confront each other, as it
were, upon common ground.

I have tried to indicate in the following pages the
various items of my indebtedness in the preparation of

PREFACE

this work. In some cases, however, mere references are
not enough. The writings of Professor O. Seeck have
not only given me much information which I would
otherwise have missed, but have proved stimulating and
fruitful in suggestions. The "Prolegomena" and notes
which Professor A. C. McGiffert and Dr. E. C. Richard-
son contributed some twenty-five years ago to the vol-
ume devoted to Eusebius in the Nicene and Post-Nzcefie
Fathers were among the first guides to introduce me to
the field of work in which I have since found much
rather unexpected interest. To Lorenzo Valla's Libellus
de /also credit a et ementita Consta7ttint donatione, with
its keen wit and able, though defective, historical criti-
cism, I owe my first interest in subjects dealt with in the
latter part of my work.

I had originally intended to add an English translation
of Valla's Treatise as an appendix to this work. It has
seemed best, however, to publish the translation, together
with a critical edition of the text, in separate form.
This, I hope, may appear within a short time. Among
the greatest obligations I owe for help in the present
publication is that to Professor Deane P. Lockwood, of
Columbia University, for his reading and frequent re-
vision of this translation. Though the publication of
this is deferred, many of his suggestions have been of
value in other connections.

To Professor J. T. Shotwell, of Columbia University,
I am indebted for countless manifestations of efficient
leadership in a field of study in which he is master, for
suggestions both as to the general plan and as to details,
which have always been helpful. For the time and
trouble which he has freely given no acknowledgment
can be too great. I wish also to express my sense of
obligation to Professor W. W. Rockwell, of Union

PREFACE

iii

Theological Seminary, for reading my manuscript and
strengthening the discussion of a number of points by
his comments. Among others who have contributed,
either by direct suggestions or by making it possible for
me to obtain books otherwise inaccessible, are Professors
J. H. Robinson and Munro Smith, of Columbia Uni-
versity, Professor George L. Burr, of Cornell University,
and my colleagues, H. M. Gelston and E. H. Hollands,
now of the University of Kansas. To the editors of the
Series in which this work appears my thanks are due for
courteous and effective co-operation and for help w'hich
has made the burden of publication comparatively easy.

Christopher B. Coleman.

Butler College, Indianapolis, April, 1914,

{

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGB

Introduction 9

PART ONE

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY
THE HISTORICAL FACTS

CHAPTER I

The Problem , 17

CHAPTER II

The Imprint of Christianity upon Constantine's Laws,
Inscriptions and Writings

1. Laws 25

2. Coinage 45

3. Inscriptions 47

4. Writings 53

CHAPTER III

Imperial Patronage of Christianity; Attitude toward Paganism

1. Church building 56

2. Constantine's actions at Rome 61

3. Personal favor shown churchmen and the church 62

4. Attitude toward paganism 63

5. Constantine's activity in church affairs, and his motives 67

CHAPTER IV

The " Conversion " of Constantine, and the Religious
Revolution of His Time

1. Various early versions 72

2. Constantine's early paganism 73

3. Campaign against Maxentius, and adoption of the Christian labarum . , 77

5] 5

6 CONTENTS [ 6

PACE

4. Constantine's Christianity 81

5. Transition from paganism to Christianity in the Roman Empire .... 82

6. Constantine's baptism 87

7. Ethical aspects of Constantine's life 89

8. Summary 94

PART TWO

THE LEGENDARY CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY
CHAPTER I

The Legend Makers

1. Significance of legends about Constantine 99

2. Lack of the historical spirit in Constantine's time 100

3. Incentives to legend making 102

4. Constantine's part in the process 105

5. Eusebius of Caesarea 107

CHAPTER II

Legends of Constantine's Origin and Rise to Imperial Position ;
Legends About Helena

1. Legend of Claudian descent 112

2. Legends of Helena and the True Cross 116

3. Later legends of Constantine's birth and rise to imperial position. ... 120

CHAPTER III
The Hostile, Pagan I egend of Constantine

1. Its meagerness 123

2. Emperor Julian's version of Constantine 124

3. Development of the pagan legend 128

CHAPTER IV
Early Legends of Divine Aid, Conversion, Saintliness

1. Pagan and Christian legends of divine aid 131

2. Early legends of miraculous conversion 135

3. Legends of saintliness 141

4. Legends of church building 147

5. Legends of the founding of Constantinople 148

7] CONTENTS y

FAca

CHAPTER V

Later Legends of Constantine's Conversion and Baptism

1. Legends of Constantine's conversion by Helena, of his baptism by

Eusebius of Rome 152

2. Earliest version of Constantine's leprosy 153

3. Armenian version of this legend . ...... 155

4. Connection of the legend with Rome and with Sylvester 158

5. The Vita Silvestri 161

6. Development of the Sylvester-Constantine legend . . . 164

7. General acceptance of the legend • . . . 169

PART THREE

THE SPURIOUS CONSTANTINE: THE
CONSTITUTUM CONSTANTINI

CHAPTER I
History of the Constitutum Constantini

1. The Constitutum Constantini and the " Donation " it contains 175

2. Acceptance and use of the Constitutum Constantini and its " Donation " 178

CHAPTER II
Exposure of the Forgery

1. Stages of criticism 184

2. Criticism of the Donation " previous to the fifteenth -century. ..... 184

3. The contest against the papacy in the early fifteenth century, and Cusanus'

criticism of the " Donation " 188

4. Valla's Treatise 191

5. Other critics in the time of the Renaissance 199

CHAPTER III

The " Donation " in the Protestant Revolution. Modern
Scientific Criticism of the " Donation "

1. Hutten's publication of Valla's Treatise 203

2. Luther's attitude, Protestant attack, Catholic defense 204

3. Baronius 206

4. Character of modern, scientific, criticism 208

5. Conclusions as to the origin of the " Donation " 209

8 CONTENTS ["8

PAGE

Appendix to Part Three

Documents Connected with the History of the Constitutum
constantini and the " donation "

I. Vita Silvestri (in part) 217

II. Constitutum Constantini 228

III. Cusanus' criticism of the '< Donation " , . . . ... . . 237

Bibliography 243

Index , . . 255

t
i

INTRODUCTION

Few generations have occupied a position of such de-
cisive importance in European history as did that of
Constantine the Great. It was the crisis in the rise of
Christianity to dominance in European civilization. The
part which the Emperor himself took in this momentous
revolution makes him one of the most commanding
figures of antiquity. It is with this aspect alone of his
reign that the following pages deal. Though his mili-
tary, financial and political arrangements were of con-
siderable significance for subsequent times, I have
referred to them only incidentally, and so far as is neces-
sary for my specific purpose. I have, however, attempted
to make a fairly full and critical study of Constantine in
his relation to Christianity.

This study early divided itself into three sections.
First, it was necessary to get at the historical facts, so
far as ascertainable, of Constantine's attitude toward
Christianity and the Church. Second, the legendary
process had to be taken into account by which Constan-
tine's actual position in religious matters was dis-
torted, and in this distorted form influenced subsequent
generations. In the third place, consideration had to be
given to the extension of this legendary process in a
great forgery, the so-called Donation of Constantine.
The first Christian emperor may thus be said to have
had in European history three distinct spheres of influ-
ence, occupied respectively by the real, the legendary,
and the spurious Constantine. The latter two have their
9] ^ 9

lO CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [lo

own intrinsic importance as well as the first/ They are
of interest also as illustrating the history of the intel-
lectual development of Europe. No tests of this devel-
opment are more illuminating than the function played
in various generations by legendary processes and the
reaction of different groups of men toward mistaken
traditional conceptions.

The historical" rather than the "real" Constantine,
however, must be our point of departure. Even in fields
where vast funds of original sources of information are
at hand and where an enormous amount of critical work
has been done, it is presumptuous to claim knowledge
of men and of facts as they would appear to the eyes of
omniscience. The best that we can do under the most
favorable circumstances is to approximate toward the
real men and the real facts ; between us and them there
always remains a margin of ignorance, if not of error,
which we may well call the ''historical equation." This
does not mean that we are left with merely " lies agreed
upon," for modern scientific methods are rigorous guides
toward the truth, and though lies remain, even the most
superficial reader knows how far historians are from
agreeing upon them. In discussing men of the fourth
century, however, it must be admitted that anything like
complete truth seems unattainable. Information on most
important points often fails us entirely, and, as will be
seen, much information that we possess is open to grave
suspicion. Yet with reference to Constantine, it can be
said that we possess a mass of evidence which has been
made available in critical editions of sources, and which

'C/. Dunning: * 'Truth in History." America?t Historical Review,
xxix (1914), pp. 217-229. The point is that primary importance often
attaches not so much to what happened, as to what later ages believed
to have happened.

Il] INTRODUCTION II

is being augmented and sifted to such an extent that a
reliable historical discussion of his religious position is
possible. This I attempt to give in Part One.

Legends about Constantine have for the most part
been approached from a mistaken point of view. They
have been used by some as reliable sources and by others
have been scornfully rejected as not worth consideration.
Both attitudes are wrong.

The time has passed for the kind of history that is
made up of unsupported traditions or that fills in its
vacant spaces and obscure origins with untested stories.
Legend usually throws little light upon the actual course
of events, and Vv'hat light it does throw is generally mis-
leading, so that in reconstructing the past the investi-
gator often does well to ignore it entirely unless he has
some test by which to sort out its genuine basis from its
fable. Instead of trying to sift out truth from error by
making allowances for probable distortions, he usually
does better if he looks for other sources of information
in documents, in monuments and in traces of earlier
conditions surviving in later institutions. Scientific re-
search has not only destroyed mistaken legends, but has
been able to displace so many of these by more reliable
facts that the validity of this method can no longer be
doubted.

But though legendary history is doomed, the history
of the legend remains. The story it contains may not
throw much light upon the subject about which it has
grown up, but it reveals the working of the minds of the
people w^ho consciously or unconsciously created it. A
legend may often be the most direct approach to the
spirit of the time in which it gained currency, and the
clearest illustration of its ideals and its modes of thought.
Its deviation from historical fact is here the most im-
portant thing about it.

CGNSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[12

After the legend becomes crystallized its history is
significant. The most obvious value is the influence
which it exercises where it is accepted. For an accepted
legend has just as much influence as an accepted histor-
ical truth. The mistaken belief of American statesmen
about the boundaries of Louisiana determined their atti-
tude toward the limitation of Florida and of Mexico
precisely as if this belief were correct. Unfounded
pagan stories about the early Christians, and unfounded
Christian stories about the Jews, had all the potency of
verified facts.

A less obvious, but an important value of the history
of a crystallized legend attaches to the attitude taken
toward it by those whom their generation esteems its
scholars. Their acceptance or rejection of it, the tests
they apply to it, and the way in which they fit it into
their general fund of knowledge shows vividly the intel-
lectual level of their age. A wide study of legends would
be one of the most illuminating chapters in the history
of history. Part Two, dealing with legends about Con-
stantine, is an attempt to contribute to this end.

The Donation of Constantine takes us into the study
of a different field of intellectual activity. Legends are
the spontaneous creation of man's fancy. They are often
the echo of his own deepest convictions and highest
ideals projected into the past and coming back to him
as the voices of the dead. But not all the men of the
Middle Ages were satisfied to let their imagination play
about the tomb of the first Christian emperor. They
brought him at length out of his grave and put into his
mouth a legal grant of vast powers to the Roman Church
and the Roman bishop. Perhaps in the mind of the
forger this was not an essentially different act from the
earlier legendary processes. Scheffer-Boichorst argues

jo] introduction 13

that his chief motive was the glorification of Constantine
and Pope Sylvester, to whom the grant was assumed to
be made/ The late Doctor Hodgkin even suggested,
hesitatingly, that the Donation might have been originally
composed as an exercise in romancing.'' But in form at
least it was plainly a forgery, and even in the eighth and
ninth centuries such forgeries were punishable with
death.'' It was taken seriously and generally accepted
as a legal document for nearly six hundred years. It
filled so large a place in the thought of Europe that we
can justly call it the most famous forgery in history.
Dr. Hodgkin even goes so far as to say, The story of
the Donation of Constantine fully told would almost be
the history of the Middle Ages." *

On the other hand, the unravelling of this skein of
forgery is one of the most interesting phases of the de-
velopment of the modern scientific spirit. The proof
advanced by Lorenzo Valla that the document was spur-
ious constitutes in the Renaissance an event emphasized
by many writers. In more recent times discussion of
various problems connected with the forgery has engaged
the energy of many of the foremost historians of Italy,
France, England, and especially of Germany, and has
produced an extensive and important historical literature.
A careful and systematic study of this whole develop-
ment, such as is attempted in the following pages in
Part Three, will throw considerable light upon the
workings of both the medieval and the modern mind.

^Cf. infra, p. 211 ei seq.

^ Italy and Her Invaders , vol. vii., (1899) p. 135 et seq.
^ Cf. Brunner : Das Constitutum Constantini, in Festgabe fur Rudolf
von Gneist, pp. 34-35.
* Op. cit.. vii., p. 135.

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

PART ONE
THE HISTORICAL FACTS

CHAPTER I

THE PROBLEM

What was the precise part of Constantine in the revo-
lution by which Christianity became the dominant re-
Hgion of European civilization? The question and its
answer have many ramifications. Of little importance
for us is the much-discussed matter of the sincerity of
his motives. Plausible motives are easily manufactured
to fit any point of view and aid immensely in the con-
struction of an interesting, consistent narrative; but the
purposes actually controlling a man's conduct are often
obscure to himself and, save by means of self-rev-
elation, not often ascertainable by others. Only novelists
may postulate a set of motives and develop conduct
accordingly; the historian may infer them, but he is
not at liberty to reconstruct the course of events upon
such inferences. The important questions are really
those of conduct and of public influence, and these
are matters of record and of fact. If the public policy
of Constantine and the course of his religious life, so far
as it was in the open, can be ascertained, we shall know
all that is here essential. And this knowledge will take
us to the very heart of the reciprocal process by which
the Roman Empire assumed Christianity, and the Church
assumed, so far as in it lay, the control of the future of
Europe.

Both phases of this process seem at first sight utterly
revolutionary. Under Constantine's immediate prede-
17] ^7

l8 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [ig

cessors the Roman government bent itself to the task
of exterminating Christianity as an alien and hostile
power. Under him and his immediate successors the
resources of the state were often put at the disposal of
the church. The empire, in addition to its already
crushing burdens, took up the support of the church
and made itself the vehicle upon which the once perse-
cuted religion rode in triumph to its task of establishing
the " City of God " upon the earth. The church pre-
-"sents an equally startling contrast in its progress. Not
long before this the disciples of Jesus had been a power-
less minority, under the control of a political and social
system which outraged their religion. Most of them, in
the first days in Palestine, and afterwards for several
generations, saw no outcome for the hopeless conflict of
the new life with the old order except in some great
cataclysm in which the existing world-order itself should
be utterly destroyed and Christ should reign with his
saints in a new heaven and a new earth. In the third
century they still thought of their hope and their true
citizenship as in heaven, for this world seemed hopelessly
hostile and evil. Within a single generation, however,
this was, for the leading churchmen, all changed. A
new and fresh era of existence had begun to appear and
a light hitherto unknown suddenly to dawn from the
midst of darkness on the human race."' When that
apparent impossibility, a Christian emperor, came upon
the scene, and invited into his council-chamber bishops
who bore upon their bodies the marks of jail and tor-
ture, at least one of those present thought that a pic-
ture of Christ's kingdom was thus shadowed forth."
While the future heaven has never passed out of the

* Eusebius, Life of Constantine, iii, i.
Ibid.y iii, 15.

ig] THE PROBLEM ig

thought of the church, this shadowing forth of it upon
earth speedily absorbed the energy of a large proportion
of churchmen. The world was no longer hopelessly
hostile ; the church was at home in it, and contemplation
of the speedy and hoped-for destruction of the earth
gave place to an age-long struggle to control and gov-
ern it in the name of him whom it had once crucified.

This double transformation, one of the greatest in the
history of the world, was, however, wrought by forces
which can be, to a large extent, historically analyzed and
estimated. Many of them had long been working slowly
and almost imperceptibly. They converged in Con-
stantine, and it is this that gives importance to the ques-
tion of the part he had in them. His career is an illus-
tration of the process, and his reign marks its crisis.
It is of great importance, therefore, to find out, so far as
the emperor was concerned, how the government ac-
cepted Christianity and how Christians accepted the
governance of the world.

The answer to these questions is not ready at hand.
There is, to be sure, much material, and most of it has
been critically examined from one point of view or
another. Literature upon Constantine has been almost
steadily produced ever since the beginning of his reign,
and has been recently stimulated by various official cele-
brations of the sixteenth centennial (1913) of the Edict,
or Rescript, of Milan. The main facts of his career seem
fairly well established, but historical complacency is
always subject to jolts such as that received from Otto
Seeck's attempt in 1891 to prove that there had never
been any Edict of Milan. The prevailing views of Con-
stantine's religious position, developed out of many
variant opinions and considerable controversy, must still
be held subject to review and revision.

20 COXSTAXTIXE AXD CHRISTIAXITY [20

Until modern times historians generally accepted as
an established fact that he openly and sincerely professed
Christianity from the time of his victory over Maxentius
(312). Gibbon, in " T/ie Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire,'' looked upon him as a supporter of the church,
and thought that his conversion m.ay perhaps have been
genuine.' Niebuhr, however, saw in Constantine a "re-
pulsive phenomenon" of mingled paganism and Christi-
anity, a superstitious man pursuing his own selfish ends.^
Burckhardt in ''Die Zeit Constayitins der Grosse7t,'' an
epoch-making work and for years the standard life of
Constantine, started with the bold (and unhistorical)
proposition that in the case of a man of genius, to
whom ambition and desire for mastery give no rest,
there can be no question of Christianity or paganism ;
such a man is essentially unreligious." ^ He even char-
acterized Constantine as a " m.urdering egoist," and
ascribes to him as his only religion, a belief in his own
conquering genius. His laws accordingly were held to
indicate not even a desire to advance the interests of
Christianity, but only his use of that religion as part of
the political machinery of the empire.

AJter Burckhardt, the tendency ran strongly toward
acceptance of the view that Constantine professed to
adopt Christianity for political motives and used it for
political purposes, but did not commit either himself or
the empire to it. Theodor Keim ^ while contending that
Constantine was affected somewhat by Christianity and

^Chap. XX.

^Lectures on the History of Rome. Third ed., Eng. trans., 1853, iii,
p. 318.

^P. 369 (this work appeared first in 1853),

* Der Uebertritt Constantins des Grossen zum Christenthum, 1862.

21]

THE PROBLEM

came out openly as a Christian at the end ' interpreted
his official actions as hedging between paganism and
Christianity. Theodor Zahn pictured him as champion
of a vague monotheism, not specifically Christian, till his
contest with Licinius, thereafter he was definitely Chris-
tian. Marquardt ^ affirmed that Constantine erected
heathen temples in Constantinople and that he never
broke wath Roman religious traditions ; it was uncertain
whether he ever was a Christian. Brieger^ inferred from
Constantine's coinage and other records that he had a
sort of Christian superstition wdiich yet did not supplant
his original heathen ideas. Victor Duruy^ found Con-
stantine's emblems and religious deliverances ambiguous,
and the emperor's actions the result of calculation, not
of religious conviction or even preference. Herman
Schiller^ endeavored to prove a gradual favoring of
Christianity at least to the extent of putting it on a legal
level with the old paganism, and concluded that Con-
stantine's policy was to form an official religion balanc-
ing the better elements of pagan monotheism with Chris-

^Keim rendered the phrase with which Constantine prefaced the an-
nouncement of his decision to be baptized, as given by Eusebius in his
Lite of Constantine (iv, 62), "let all duplicity be banished," thus im-
plying that the emperor had previously been two-faced. The Greek
term used, a//0//?o/.m, means merely doubt, or uncertainty, and Eusebius,
of all men, would not have implied any hypocrisy on the emperor's
part.

' Constantin der Grosse und die Kirche, 1876.
^ Romische Staatsverwaltung (1878), iii, 113.

* Constantin der Grosse als Religionspolitiker, Zeitschrift fur Kir-
chengeschichte iv (1880), ii, 163.

Histoire des Romains, 1870 and later, vol. vii, p. 127 ff.; " Les
Premieres annees du regne de Constantin ' ' in Compte rendu de
V Acadtmie des Sciences morales et poliiiques, xvi, 737-765 (1881), and
*'La politique religieuse de Constantin," 7(^>z£/., xvii, 185-227 (1882),
and Revue archaeologique, xliii, g^-iio, 155-175 (1882).

^ Geschichte der romischen Kaiserzeit , 1883-7.

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[22

! tianity. Victor Schultze/ Grisar, ^ and G. Boissiere de-
fended his essential Christianity.

The remarkable work of O. Seeck/ which has almost
superseded earlier writings on the subject, has at length
reshaped historical opinion about Constantine. Seeck's
conclusion, from a most exhaustive study of all the sources,
is that Constantine was favorably inclined to Christianity
from the first, that he was definitely converted to adher-
ence to the God of the Christians as his patron and luck-
bringer during the campaign against Maxentius ^ and that
thereafter he supported the Christian church even to the
point of subserviency, and introduced Christianity as the
state religion so far as conditions permitted. In many of
his contentions Seeck has been vigorously attacked by F.
Gorres^ and others, yet he and Schultze have exer-
cised dominant influence and have been very generally
followed. 7 Duchesne^ looks upon Constantine as a gen-

' Geschichte des Untergangs des griechischen roniischen Heidentums ,
1887-03.

* " Die vorgeblichen Beweise gegen die Christlichkeit Constantins des
Grosser! ", in Zeitschrift fur katholische Theologie vi (1882) 585-607.

Essais d'histoire religieuse " in Revue des deux Mondes July 1886
pp. 51-72, " La Fin du Pagmiisme " (1891).

Geschichte des Untergangs der antiken Welt 1895 et seg., second
edition 1897 seq., third edition 1910 et seq., and numerous articles in
historical reviews, especially in Zeitsch. f. K. G. ^312 A. D.

^Zeitschrift ficr wissenschaftliche Theologie (1892), p. 282 et seq.
Eg., J. B. Bury in his edition of Gibbon : Decline and Fall of the
Roman Empire (1896), vol. ii, append. 19, pp. 566-568; W. K. Boyd:
The Ecclesiastical Edicts of the Theodosian Code, Columbia University
Studies in ITistory, Economics and Public Law vol. xxiv (1905), pp.
16-21. An interesting illustration of this transformation of historical
opinion is seen in the revision of current text-books for ancient history
in line with Seecks' contentions. Cf. G. W. Botsford : Ancient History
for Beginners (1902), pp. 422-43, and his History of the Ancient World
(1913), pp. 514-515.

^ Histoire ancienne de VEglise, vol. ii, English trans. (1912), pp.
45-71. The first edition was dated 1905.

23]

THE PROBLEM

uine convert and patron of the church. Ludwig Wrzol'
emphasizes Constantine's ascription of victory-giving
power to the Christian God and looks upon most of the
emperor's actions after the battle at the Milvian bridge as
an expression of his desire to be on the right side of this
power. Ed. Schwartz ^ finds in him sincere attachment
to Christianity in its organized form, but far from admit-
ting his subserviency to the Christian bishops which Seeck
describes, he pictures Constantine as the ambitious seeker
of supreme power and dominating master of the church.
In the first proposition he is thus in agreement with
Seeck, but in the latter with Burckhardt. One recent
writer 3 turns against the present tendency, to substantial
agreement with Burckhardt's view of the emperor's char- '
acter and describes him as utterly irreligious and taking
up with Christianity for merely political purposes. But
in this Geffcken stands almost alone. On the other
hand, the contributors to the most pretentious of the
books called out by the centennial of the Edict of Milan,
Konstantin der Grosse und seine Zeit,^ reproduce in
large part that view of the relations of Constantine and
the church most favorable to both. ^

While, as has been said, the main facts of Constantine's
career now seem clear, the very bulk of this literature,
as well as the differences and contradictions it expresses,

^ Konstantins des Grossen persdnliche Siellung zum Christentum.
Weidenauer Studien, I (1906), pp. 227-269,

Kaiser Constantin und die christliche Kirche (1913).
*Johs. Geffcken, Aus der Werdezeit des Christentums (1904), p. 97
et seq.

'Edited by F. J. Dolger, 1913.

* For other recent discussions see Gwatkin in Cambridge Medieval
History, vol. i (1911) p. 10 et seq., and J. B. Carter: The Religious
Life of Ancient Rome (1911), p. wj et seq.

24 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [24

calls for a general restatement of his attitude in religious
matters, and for a revaluation of its significance. Such
restatement must take into account the knowledge which
recent years have brought of the general religious con-
dition of Constantine's times. It is possible only on the
basis of an examination of all the original evidence.
And in this the emphasis must be put upon legal and
monumental sources, such as are contained in the Theo-
dosian Code and in coins and inscriptions ; for, as will
be shown later, the writers of the fourth century had
little comprehension of pure historical truth and less de-
votion to it. Partisanship, eulogy, and defamation were
all too common, and these were then, as now, more apt
to create legends than to produce adequate appreciation
of men and events.

CHAPTER II

THE IMPRINT OF CHRISTIANITY UPON CONSTANTINE's
LAWS, INSCRIPTIONS AND WRITINGS

I . Legislation '

CoNSTANTiNE was a voluminous law-maker ; fragments
of nearly 300 of his laws are in existence, and we have
information about others issued and now lost.'' He was
not a systematic nor a careful legislator; many of his laws
are not clear, many are trivial, and many are badly ex-

^ For various phases of this subject cf. Seeck's discussion of Con-
stantine's laws in Zeitschrift der Savigny Stiftung ficr Rechtsge-
schichte, Romanische Abteilung, x, p. i et seq., p. 177 et seq. Also
Boyd, op. cit.

Many of Constantine's laws, but by no means all that are extant, are
printed in Migne: J. P., Patrologiae Cursus Completus Series Latina
viii, cols. 93-400. Most of the extant ones have been preserved
in the Theodosian Code and the Constitution of Sirmondi printed with
it. Many not found elsewhere, as well as some duplications, are given
in Eusebius' Church History and in his Life of Constantine. Many
of these latter, however, are questioned, cf. infra, pp. 38, 109. Some
laws are found in Augustine's writings against the Donatists, and
others are referred to by Jerome and other ecclesiastical writers.

Under the title of Legislation I have included rescripts (rescripta) as
well as edicts (edicta, decreta). Strictly speaking, rescripts were
answers to inquiries. They were cited as decisions, rather than as leg-
islation. Constantine seems to have begun the custom of issuing laws
in rescript form, i. e., in letters to praefects. Seeck dates the custom
from December i, 318. Cf. op. cit., x, pp. 199, 221.

A number of Constantine's laws bearing on Christianity are trans-
lated in Ayer, J. C, Jr., A Source Book tor Ancient Church History
(New York, 1913), pp. 263-265, 277-296.

' Cf. Seeck, Untergang der antiken Welt, i, 54.

25] 25

26 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [26

pressed. Decadence of legal style had already set in by
his time.

The laws of Constantine show a progressively favor-
able attitude toward the Christians. None of his legis-
lation while he was in control of Gaul and Britain alone
has come down to us except references to his religious
toleration. While he ruled the entire West, but not the
East (that is, from his victory over Maxentius in 312 till
his victory over Licinius in 323) his legislation involved
complete toleration towards Christians, and, in general,
establishment of equality between Christianity and
paganism. After he became sole emperor, that is from
324 to his death in 337, his legislation became more
definitely Christian and anti-pagan.^ Seeck, who main-
tains Constantine's complete adherence to Christianity
after 312, recognizes this distinction.^ A somewhat
detailed analysis of the two periods, 312-323 and 323-
336, is necessary to a full knowledge of the facts.

Before the final victory over Licinius (323) we have
no direct legislation against essential pagan institutions. ^
Legislation friendly to the Christians, however, is in
evidence from the time of the victory over Maxentius
(312). Very soon after that event Constantine and
Licinius, doubtless at the initiative of the former, reached
an agreement at Milan to establish general and complete
religious toleration, and issued a comprehensive edict or
rescript to that effect, specifically putting Christianity

^ Cf. Bury's summary of Schiller's description of Constantine's laws
in Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ed. Bury, vol. ii,
p. 567.

* He ascribes the absence of a more positively Christian attitude in
the earlier legislation to motives of policy.

'For legislation limiting magic and the consulting of haruspices, cf.
infra, pp. 35-36.

27]

CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS

on a level with other legal religions.' This is the famous
and lately controverted Edict of Milan. The contro-
versy was begun in 1891 by O. Seeck, who denied that
the document given by Lactantius and by Eusebius was
in any respect the work of Constantine, that it was
issued from Milan, or that it was an imperial edict. ^ He
maintained that these authors gave merely copies of a
rescript issued by Licinius after his victory over Maxi-
minus (or Maximin) Daza, probably as soon as he
entered Nicomedia, the capital of the first conquered
province, reinstating and enforcing the Edict of Tolera-
tion of Galerius (311) which Maximinus had not ob-
served. There would thus be only one edict of tolera-
tion, that putting an end to the Diocletian persecution ;
and this reissue of it should be called simply the Rescript
of Nicomedia. Seeck supported his opinion by argu-
ments drawn from the informality of the so-called edict,
from the chronological difficulty involved in the accepted
account, and from the reference, " all conditions being
entirely left out which were contained in our former
letter," etc. ("quare scire dignationem tuam convenit
* * * placuisse nobis ut amotis omnibus omnino con-
ditionibus * * * contendant). Seeck's article was an-
swered by F. Gorres and by Crivelluci.^ The former's

' Eusebius, Church History, ix, 9. 12, Our knowledge of its provis-
ions is obtained from two documents, Lactantius, De Mortibus perse-
cuiorum, xlviii, and Eusebius, op. cit., x, 5, 2-14. Each of these has
its champions as a copy of the original rescript, and by others both are
denied that rank.

' " Das sogennante Edikt von Mailand, " in Zeitschrift fur Kirchen-
geschichte, xii, p. 381 et seq. In his later Geschichte des Untergangs
der Antiken Welt, he assumed that he had proved his point and merely
remarked in a note that he had not spoken of the Edict of Milan because
in his opinion such an edict never existed. Vol. i (Anhang), p. 495.
(Berlin, 1897).

'The former in Zeitsch. f. wissenschaftliche Theol., xxxv (1892), pp.
282-95; the latter in Studi storici, i, p. 239 et seq.

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[28

answer consists largely of ridicule and invective, inter-
spersed freely v^ith exclamation points, but he rightly
emphasizes the obvious fact that there are essential
differences between the Edict of Galerius and this later
edict or letter, the former being polytheistic in tone and
giving bare toleration to the Christians, whereas the
latter is rather monotheistic and provides for a large
measure of general religious liberty together with res-
toration of confiscated Christian property to its former
owners. The original edict of Milan he thinks has been
lost, but Eusebius and Lactantius reproduce it in giving
respectively a translation and a copy of rescripts pub-
lished by Licinius in their provinces. The latter writer
also maintains that there was an edict of Milan.

The ablest discussion of the question is that by Her-
mann Hiille.' He accepts an edict of Milan but limits it
to complete religious toleration and ascribes the policy
of restitution of Christian property to later rescripts,
such as that of Constantine to Anulinus in Africa. In
his opinion Lactantius probably gives a rescript issued
afterwards by Licinius for Bithynia, and Eusebius, a later
Palestinian version of this, both being amplifications and
extensions of the brief Milan edict. Valerian Sesan ^
argues at great length that Eusebius gives a Greek
translation of the original rescript of Milan, and Lac-
tantius a form of it issued by Licinius from Nikomedia.
He holds, however, the untenable ground that both
allude to a lost edict of Constantine's dating from 312.

Die Toleranzerlasse romischer Kaiser fur das Christentum, (Berlin,
1895), pp. 80-106. The same conclusions are reached by V. Schultze in
the articles on Constantine in the Real-Enzyklopadie fiir protestantische
Theologie und Kirche, x, 7S7-773 (iQOi).

^ Kirche und Staat im romisch-byzantinischen Reiche seit Konstantin
dent Grosse7i und bis zum Falle Konstantinopels, vol. i (191 1), pp.
128-237.

CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS

Another investigator, Joseph Wittig/ arrives independ-
ently at the same general conclusions as Sesan, combat-
ing, however, the assumption of a lost edict of 312.

The meeting of Constantine and Licinius at Milan in
313 and the promulgation there of an edict or rescript of
religious toleration are established by adequate evidence
beyond reasonable doubt. Lactantius undoubtedly gives,
according to his own statement, not this original edict,
but a rescript of Licinius' based upon it and issued at
Nicomedia. I cannot see in the arguments of Sesan and
Wittig sufficient reason for putting Eusebius' version
upon a different basis from that of Lactantius and call-
ing it a translation of the original Milan edict. ^ More
probably Eusebius gave the version of the rescript
which was published in his part of the Empire. How
far this rescript reproduces the edict or rescript of Milan
it is impossible to say. Hiille's limitation of the latter
to religious toleration seems not altogether warranted.
It probably not only ordered the recognition of Christi-
anity on exactly the same standing as to toleration as
that of the established religions, and not only involved

' " Das Toleranzreskript von Mailand 313," in Konstantin der Grosse
und seine Zeit, ed. Franz J. Dolger (1913), pp. 40-65.

*Wittig's comparison of differences between the texts is specious
rather than convincing. E.g., where Eusebius is briefer, this proves
his form to be the original ; where he is lengthier, this proves that
Lactantius condensed. Where Lactantius represents Licinius as using
phrases less vaguely monotheistic and more specifically Christian than
Eusebius gives, this shows that Licinius, not being a Christian {cf. Eu-
sebius X, 5,4-5, and Lactantius xlviii,4-5), was eager to proclaim his vol-
untary recognition of Constantine's god, so as to avoid the reproach of
being overborn by Constantine ! The omission of an introductory sec-
tion in Lactantius and of the possessive pronoun where Eusebius' ver-
sion cites former orders as "our former letters " maybe significant but
furnishes no argument for Wittig's position {cf. Eusebius x, 5, 2-3,
omitted in Lactantius ; cf. Eusebius, § 6 and Lactantius, § 6) .

30 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [30

the principle of religious liberty, but also directed
the restoration of church property which had been
confiscated from the Christians.^ The rescript given
by Lactantius differs in a number of places from
the translation given by Eusebius, but both are mono-
theistic in tone, the latter rather more vaguely so than
the former. What could be more vague than the phrase
quoted by Eusebius, " that so whatever divine and
heavenly power there is may be propitious to us "

(byrug b t'l -nore zarL OeioTTjrog Kai ovpav'iov Trpdyjuarog, Tjulv .... evuevkg elvci

dvvr/Hri, for Lactautius' quo quidem divinitas in sede
coelesti nobis . . . propitia possit existere")?^ Both
versions concur in ascribing the previous success of the
rulers to divine aid and in assigning as the motive of
the law desire for continuance of divine favor. " So
shall that divine favor which, in affairs of the mightiest
importance, we have already experienced, continue to
give success to us, and in our successes make the com-
monwealth happy. "3 These may well have characterized
the original edict or rescript and have represented Con-
stantine's religious status in 313, for his influence, rather
than that of Licinius, must in this have been dominant.

The policies of complete religious toleration and of the
restoration to Christians of their property formerly con-
fiscated were in any case adopted by Constantine soon
after he became sole emperor in the west. Eusebius
places immediately after the rescript discussed above, a
rescript to Anulinus in Africa, ordering the immediate
restoration to the Catholic church of all property which
had been confiscated from it.'^ This rescript makes no

' Cf. Eusebius, Life of Constantine, i, 14.

^Eusebius, Church History x, 5, 4. Lactantius, op. cii., xlviii, 4.

* Eusebius, op. cii., x, 5, 13. Cf. Lactantius, op. cii., xlviii, 13.

* Eusebius, op. cit., x, 5, 15-17.

31 ] CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS 31

provision for the compensation of the purchasers and
holders of this property, whereas both the Eusebian and
the Lactantian version of the rescript of Licinius pro-
vide for the compensation from the pubhc treasury of legal
holders of confiscated Christian property. The rescript
to Anulinus is generally supposed to have been issued
after the edict of Milan, but VVittig argues plausibly that
it antedated the latter and represents a less matured plan
of dealing with the problem/ If so, whether at Milan
or elsewhere, Constantine soon provided for reimburs-
ing the losers, for he was always very free with public
moneys.

Among the laws which Constantine issued between 313
and 323 in favor of the church, beyond complete tolera-
tion, the following may be noted.

The clergy were exempted from all state contributions. '
How substantial this concession was may be seen from
the rush which ensued toward the clerical status. It
was so great that by 320 another edict was issued limiting
entrance to the clergy to those classes whose exemption
would not make much difference either to the state or to
themselves. This was not retroactive and did not dis-
turb those who were already clerics. ^ Great as was the
concession however, it was not an exaltation of Christi-
anity above other religions, for such exemptions were
commonly made to priests of acknowledged religions.

^ Op. cit., pp. 51, 52.

^ Codex Theodosianus , xvi,2,2(3i9) . ' ' Qui clivino cultui ministeria re-
ligionis impendunt, id est hi, qui clerici appelantur, ab omnibus omnino
muneribus excusentur, ne sacrilego livore quorundam a divinis obsequiis
avocentur. " Cf. earlier letter of Constantine's instructing Anulinus to
exempt the clergy of the Catholic church, over which Csecilian pre-
sided, from public duties. Eusebius, Church History, x, 7.

*Cod. Theod., xvi, 2, 3. (326)

32 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [32

Constantine himself extended substantially the same ex-
emptions to the patriarchs and elders of the Jews, to
whom in general he was not friendly. '

A law published soon after the victory over Maxentius
shows Constantine to be interested in protecting the
machinery and the routine of church life from annoyance
at the hands of heretics, but more than a friendly inter-
est of this sort can hardly be inferred from it. ^

In 313 (or 315) the church was freed from ''annona"
and "tributum." In 320 the laws from the time of
Augustus, disqualifying those not of near kinship who
remained unmarried or childless from receiving inher-
itances, were changed, probably in deference to the celi-
bacy of the clergy, allowing celibates to inherit and re-
leasing them from all penalties. ^ In 321 manumission in
churches in the presence of the bishop and clergy was
made legal and valid. ^ In 321 wills in favor of the Cath-
olic church were permitted. ^

Constantine's laws on Sunday are of great interest.
In 321 he raised it to the rank of the old pagan holidays
(feriae) by suspending the work of the courts and of the

^ Cod. Theod. xvi, 8, 2 (a. 330, Nov. 29) and 4 (Dec. i, 331).
Cod. Theod. y.N'\, 2, i (313 (?) Oct. 31). " Haereticorum factione
conperimus ecclesiae catholicae clericos ita vexari, ut nominationibus
seu susceptionibus aliquibus, quas publicus mos exposcit, contra indulta
sibi privilegia praegraventur. Ideoque placet, si quern tua gravitas in-
venerit ita vexattim, eidem alium subrogare et deinceps a supra dictae
religionis hominibus hujusmodi injurias prohiberi. "

^ Cod. Theod. xi, i, i (June 17, 315) : viii, 16, i (Jan. 31, 320) ;
Eusebius, Life of Constantine, iv, 26.

^ Cod. Theod. iv, 7, i, cf. Codex Justinianus, i, 13, 2.

^ Cod. Theod. yLYi, 2, 4 {221) . " habeat unusquisque licentiam sanctis-
simo catholicae [ecclesiae] venerabilique concilio, decedens bonorum
quod optavit relinquere," etc. This recognizes the corporate character
of the church.

CONSTANTIXE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS

city population on that day, agricultural work, as was
usual, being expressly excepted. '

In June, of the same year, Constantine published an
amendment to the law, keeping the way open for the
manumission of slaves on Sunday.^

These laws are not positively Christian or pagan, nor are
they necessarily ambiguous as to the emperor's religious
position. The worship of the sun, "sol invictus,'' and
the observance of Sunday were integral parts of Mithra-
ism and the religion of the Great Mother generally. The
laws, therefore, might have been issued by a worshipper
of the sun. The designation of the day as the venerable
day of the sun, venerabili die Solis'' and ''diem solis
veneratione sui celebrem^'^ has sometimes been cited as
proof of Constantine's seeking at the time to do honor
to Mithras, or the sun. Such phrases, however, were
common to Christians as well as to pagans. The orien-
tal, probably at first Babylonian, system of a week of
seven days, each named from a heavenly body, had very
generally supplemented and even supplanted in popular

^ Cod. Just, iii, 12, 3. " Omnes judices, urbanaeque plebes, et
cunctarum artium officia venerabili die Solis quiescant. Ruri tamen
positi agrorum culturae libere licenterque inserviant : quoniam frequen-
ter evenit, ut non aptius alio die frumenta sulcis, aut vineae scrobibus
mandentur, ne occasione momenti pereat commoditas coelesti provisi-
one concessa." It is surprising that this law is not embodied in
the Cod. Theod,, as it is presupposed by the law of Constantine
in Cod. Theod. ii, 8, i. It may have been included and have been
lost in the copies handed down to us. The supposition that it originallj''
included non-Christian terms and was an expression of sun-worship
and was therefore omitted from the Cod. Theod. occurs to one, but is
without any support whatever.

^ Cod. Theod. ii, 8, i. Sicut indignissimum videbatur diem solis
veneratione sui celebrem altercantibus jurgiis et noxiis partium conten-
tionibus occupari, ita gratum ac jucudum est eo die quae sunt maxima
votiva compleri. Atque ideo emancipandi et manumittendi die festo
cuncti licentiam habeant et super his rebus acta non prohibeantur."

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

use the cumbersome Roman numbering of days by kal-
ends, nones and ides, long before this time.' Justin
Martyr at Rome, in the second century, used the phrase,
" day of the sun " in describing the worship of the Chris-
tians on the first day of the week.^ Tertullian in North
Africa used it {dies salts) in such a way as to show that
it was commonly employed at the end of the second cen-
tury.3 No doubt the correct, specifically Christian usage
was to refer to the first day of the week as the Lord's
Day {dies Domini or dies dominicus) , a usage still preva-
lent in religious speech ; but the name of the sun was
used very generally by the Christians for the first day of
the week even though this heavenly body was a universal
object of adoration among the heathen. Assuming that
Constantine was a thoroughgoing Christian in 321, he
would probably have proclaimed the day under the name
of " dies solis'^

The words venerabilV^ and veneratione sui cele-
brem " might be construed as savoring of sun-worship,
but they may refer as well to the worship which from a
very early time characterized the Christian observance
of the first day of the week. The second law with its
emphatic approval of, and provision for manumission of
slaves, certainly gives the whole piece of legislation
the atmosphere of Christianity rather than of Mithraism.

' Cf. Zahn : Geschichte des Sonntags, pp. 25, 26, 60, 61 ; Mommsen,
Ueber den Chronographer von 354, pp. 566, 568 ; Dio Cassius 37, 19.
In various European languages the days of the week still perpetuate
this oriental influence upon the West through Rome, though German
gods and Christian sentiment have wrought some changes. The names
of the days originally commemorated were, in order: Sun, Moon, Mars,
Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, and Saturn.

"^Apology i, 67. The phrase is used twice here.

^ Apology, xvi ; ad Nationes, i, 13.

35]

CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS

Eusebius, in his Life of Constantine,^ gives a long list of
provisions enacted by Constantine for the most pious
observance of Sunday, which are there given as spe-
cifically Christian, though the prayer which he says was
enforced on that day in the army was merely monothe-
istic. x\llowing for the edifying and eulogistic tone of
this source, it seems more probable that Eusebius at
most exaggerated the piety of the emperor than that he
entirely distorted the object of that piety, and while much
of the passage refers to the latter part of Constantine's
reign, it unquestionably includes a summary of his first
law on Sunday. Taken in connection with this and other
evidence these laws seem to have been issued with espe-
cial regard for the Christians.

Constantine's laws on the subject of magic and divina-
tion, mostly in this period of his legislation (312-323),
give no decisive indication of his relation to Christianity.
They show indeed his belief in the efficacy of these prac-
tices.^ It was only the private consulting of haruspices
and the practice of magic arts against chastity or life, or
for other harmful purposes that were forbidden. 3 Rites

' iv, 18-20.

^ Cf. Cod. Theod. ix, 16, 3 (May 23, 321-324). The law of Dec. 17,
320-321, Cod. Theod. xvi, 10, i, permits and even in some circum-
stances encourages the public consultation of haruspices. " Si quid de
palatio nostro aut ceteris operibus publicis degustatum fulgore esse con-
stiterit, retento more veteris observantiae quid portendat, ab haruspicibus
requiratur et diligentissime scribtura collecta ad nostram scientiam
referatur ; ceteris etiam usurpandae hujus consuetudinis licentia trib-
uenda, dummodo sacrificiis domesticis abstineant, quae specialiter pro-
hibita sunt. Earn autem denuntiationem adque interpretationem, quae
de tactu amphitheatri scribta est, de qua ad Heraclianum tribunum et
magistrum officiorum scribseras,ad nos. scias esse perlatam. " Cod.
Theod. ix, 16, 3, shows belief that charms could affect the weather for
the public benefit.

^ Cod. Theod. ix, 16, i, 2 and 3 ; xvi, 10, i.

CONSTANTINB AND CHRISTIANITY

[36

whose object was to prevent disease and drought were
not prohibited.'

But permission and even encouragement of superstitious
rites for certain extraordinary occurrences do not show
devotion to pagan reHgions and absence of any connec-
tion with Christianity as some writers on Constantine
have inferred. If they did, a large portion of the church

' Boyd : op. ciL, p. 19 misses the mark when he says " As his pane-
gyrist declares that Constantine fought Maxentius against the coun-
sel of men, against the advice of the haruspices, this legislation [refer-
ring especially to commands to collect and transmit to court the replies
of the haruspices] does not signify a belief in the divinatory arts, rather
an effort to forestall any attempt to make use of divination in any po-
litical conspiracy against the fortunes of the Flavian family." The
Anonymous panegyric (313) referred to (Migne : P .L., viii col. 655, c.
ii), in its " contra haruspicum monita " implies rather that Constantine
consulted the augurs, but was not discouraged by an unfavorable answer,
and the direction of the law in cases of public buildings struck by light-
ning, " retento more veteris observantise, quis portendat, ab haruspici-
bus requiretur " etc., refer to the observance of accepted practises. Be-
lief in the power of such practises was common among the Christians
themselves: they merely asserted the superior magical power of Chris-
tian observances. Cf. Lactantius, de Mort. Pers. chap. x.

It is barely possible that there may be a connection between the burn-
ing of Diocletian's palace, at the beginning of the Diocletian persecu-
tion, and Constanti ne's law in 321 {Cod. Theod. xvi, 10, i). Lactantius
it will be remembered {de Mort. Pers. cxiv) says that Galerius hired
emissaries to set the palace on fire and then laid the blame on the
Christians as public enemies. In the Easter " Oration of Constantine
to the Assembly of the Saints'' reproduced by Eusebius, Constantine is
reported as saying (chap. 25) that he was an eye-witness of the occur-
ence, that the palace was consum.ed by lightning, and that Diocletian
lived in constant fear of lightning. For an interesting note upon the
beginning of the Diocletian persecution, which still remains obscure,
see McGiffert in the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series ii, Vol-
ume i Eusebius, pp. 397-400. If, as Professor McGiffert suggests, there
was a Christian conspiracy against Galerius, this might establish a
connection in Constantine's mind between lightning, haruspices, and
plots such as Dr. Boyd assumes. Otherwise, Constantine may have
thought that as the Christian God sent lightning against Diocletian the
pagan deities or demons might send lightning against him.

CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS

would, in many different ages, have to be counted out of
Christendom.

Judging from Constantine's legislation in the west
discussed thus far, the inference would naturally be that
he was friendly disposed toward Christianity, and sought
to put it upon a full equality with former official religions
of the empire. There was no effort to suppress pagan-
ism, or even to make Christianity the one legal religion
of the empire.'

But with his final conflict with Licinius and his victory
in 323,^ Constantine's legislation seems to become more
specifically and completely Christian. A law of 323 ex-
pressly forbade any attempt to force Christians to take
part in pagan celebrations and gave redress for abuses of
this sort. 3

Several general statements of the greatest importance,
chiefly covering the period 323-336, have come down to
us from approximately Constantine's time, which if they
could be accepted in full would leave no question but
that Constantine accomplished a legal revolution, en-
tirely substituting Christianity for paganism in Roman
life. One, a law of Emperor Constans in 341, in pro-

' For a general summary of Constantine's laws in force in the west
before the victory over Licinius and put in operation in the east at that
time, from the pen of a Christian panegyrist, see Eusebius, Life of
Constantine, ii, 20 and 21.

2 Or 324, according to Seeck.

' " Quoniam comperimus quosdam ecclesiasticos et ceteros catholicae
sectae servientes a diversarum religionum hominibus ad lustrorum sac-
rificia celebranda compelli, hac sanctione sancimus, si quis ad ritum
alienae superstitionis cogendos esse crediderit eos, qui sanctissimae legi
serviunt, si conditio patiatur, publice fustibus verberetur, si vero hon-
oris ratio talem ab eo repellat injuriam, condemnationem sustineat
damni gravissimi, quod rebus publicis vindicabitur." Cod. Theod., xvi,
2, 5 (May 25, 323[?]).

^Cod. Theod., xvi, 10, 2. " Cesset superstitio, sacrificiorum abo-

38 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [38

hibiting sacrifices to the gods implies that Constantine
had earlier made the same sweeping prohibition. If
such an edict was issued, however, it has been lost.
Jerome' tells of a law for the general destruction of
pagan temples. This, too, if issued, has been entirely
lost. Eusebius refers to many laws, which, if his state-
ments are correct and his quotations genuine, would
have put a legal end to many essential features of pagan-
ism.^ Victor Schultze^ has ably defended these particu-
lar summaries of Constantine's laws, but they cannot be
taken as conclusive, in view of Eusebius' probable exag-
gerations about laws which have been preserved as well
as in view of the general character of his Li/e of Con-
stantine. Even the combined testimony of Constans'
law, Jerome, and Eusebius cannot be accepted as final.
It is contradicted by Libanius,^ who goes so far as to
say that Constantine did not at all change the legal re-
ligion ; by Zosimus,^ who says that Constantine tolerated
heathen worship ; by later exhortations of Christians
asking for such laws ; ^ and by laws expressly allowing

leatur insania. Nam quicumque contra legem divi principis parentis
nostri et hanc nostrae mansuetudinis jussionem ausus fuerit sacrificia
celebrare, conpetens in eum vindicta et praesens sententia exeratur."
^ Chronicle, under year 335.

"^Oration in Praise of Constantine, 2; 8; 9. Life of Constantine, ii,
44; 45; iii, 55-58; iv, 23; 25.

'In Zeitsch f. K. G., vii (1885), p. 369 et seq.

* Cf. Life of Constantine , iv, 18, with Constantine's actual law, Cod.
Theod., ii, 8, 1, and Cod. Just., iii, 12, 3; see above, p. 77. For in-
stances, however, in which Eusebius' statements are confirmed by the
laws which have come down to us, cf. Cod. Theod., viii, 16, i, with
Life of Constantine, iv, 26; Cod. Theod., iv, 4, 3, and ii, 24, i, and iv,
4, I, with Life of Constantine, iv, 26, 5.

'"Pro Templis, ed. Reiske (1784).

^ Roman History, ii, 29, 3.

^Eg., Firmianus, de Errore, p. 39.

39]

CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS

divination in the pagan temples/ These last may, of
course, have been abrogated by later laws such as
Eusebius and Jerome claim were issued, but there is no
proof of it other than the partisan statements of those
writers.

It seems clear, however, that though Constantine's
later laws may not have gone to the extent assumed by
Eusebius, Constans and Jerome, they show at least an
anti-pagan tendency, in the light of which the statements
of these three authorities must be interpreted as, at
most, exaggerations and not utter misstatements. There
seems to be no doubt that heathen temples suffered
severely from adverse imperial influence ; ^ and as early
as 326, in a law looking toward the completion of old
buildings before new ones were begun, it was expressly
provided that temples might be left unfinished.^

Several long and rhetorical edicts of Constantine,
notably the " Edict to the Inhabitants of the Province of
Palestine," and the " Edict to the People of the Provinces
concerning the Error of Polytheism" are given in Euse-
bius' Life of Constantine, both purporting to be from

^ Cod. Theod., xvi, 10, i (321); ix, 16, 2 and 3 (319).
' C/. infra, pp. 63-64.

^Cod. Theod., xv, i, 3 (326 [362] June 29). " Provinciarum judices
commoneri praecipimus, ut nihil se novi operis ordinare ante debere
cognoscant, quam ea compleverint, quae a decessoribus inchoata sunt,
exceptis dumtaxat templorum aedificationibus."

*ii, 24-42, and ii, 48-60, respectively. These with the other docu-
ments in this work were labeled forgeries by Crivellucci, Mommsen,
Peter, Burckhardt, Seeck and others: Seeck later accepted them as
genuine, chiefly on the ground that they are documents which would
naturally be in Eusebius' chancery, and with the specific form of ad-
dress which one would expect in copies sent to Caesarea in Palestine.
Zeiisch. f. K. G., xviii, (1898) p. 321 et seq. They are held by Schultze:
Zeitsch. f. K. G., xiv (1894), p. 527 et seq., to be forgeries by a later
hand than Eusebius', largely because (i) the former does not correspond

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

authentic copies, the former with the emperor's signa-
ture and the latter entirely in his own handwriting". If
these are genuine they show that Constantine was at
this time ' a most zealous Christian, filled with mission-
ary zeal, but determined not to use legal force in the
conversion of pagans.

Many laws were undoubtedly issued after 323 con-
ferring special privileges upon Christian churches and
Christian priests.^ From all these special privileges
heretics were expressly debarred.^ Cities which became

with what one would expect it to be from the context, ii, 20-23; (2) the
latter misstates Constantine's age (Constantine says he was a boy, i. e.
under 14, at the beginning of the Diocletian persecution in 303, which
in spite of Seeck's contrary opinion seems impossible, cf. Eusebius,
op. cit., ii, 51; i, 8, i; (3) both contain many improbabilities, contra-
dicting other information and other parts of Eusebius' writings; (4)
both are of a nature and style foreign to imperial decrees. It is hard
to see how they can safely be used as authoritative documents.
^ After his victory over Licinius.

^ " Neque vulgari consensu neque quibuslibet petentibus sub specie
clericorum a numeribus publicis vacatio deferatur, nec temere et citra
modum populi clericis connectantur, sed cum defunctus fuerit clericus,
ad vicem defuncti alius allegetur, cui nulla ex municipibus prosapia
fuerit neque ea est opulentia facultatum, quae publicas functiones facil-
lime queat tolerare, ita ut, si inter civitatem et clericos super alicujus
nomine dubitetur, si eum aequitas ad publica trahat obsequia, et pro-
genie municeps vel patrimonio idoneus dinoscetur, exemptus clericis
civitati tradatur. Opulentos enim saeculi subire necessitates oportet,
pauperes ecclesiarum divitiis sustentari." Cod. Theod., xvi, 2, 6 (June
I, 326).

" Lectores divinorum apicum et hypodiacone ceterique clerici, qui
per injuriam haereticorum ad curiam devocati sunt, absolvantur et de
cetero ad similitudinem Orientis minime ad curias devocentur, sed im-
munitate plenissima potiantur." Cod. Theod., xvi, 2, 7 (Feb. 5, 330).

" Privilegia, quae contemplatione religionis indulta sunt, catholicae
tantum legis observationibus prodesse oportet. Haereticos autem atque
schismaticos non solum ab his privilegiis alienos esse volumus, sed
etiam diversis muneribus constringi et subjici." Cod. Theod., xvi, 5, i
(Sept. I, 326).

41]

CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS

exclusively Christian were granted special imperial
favors.'

A law of 326, or about that year, conferred remarkable
civil functions on the church organization, and marks
one of the most important of the steps by which, in the
Middle Ages, it came to dominate and overshadow the
state. Litigants were allowed to bring suits before
bishops and even to transfer them thither from the civil
judges. The decision of the bishop was to be recognized
by government officials as legal and binding. The law
thus made the bishop a final court, open apparently to
any one, whether Christian or not, who chose to cite his
opponent before him. It not only gave legal authority
to the judgment which ecclesiastical authorities might
pronounce in quarrels between Christians, quarrels which,
from the days of St. Paul they had been urged to keep
within the church so as to avoid the scandal of suits in
pagan courts, ^ but it went far beyond that. It created
episcopal courts with far-reaching powers, parallel to, and
independent of, the secular courts. It was a recognition
of the church, fraught with tremendous consequences for
the future. 3

" Novatianos non adeo comperimus praedamnatos, ut his quae petive-
runt crederemus minime largienda. Itaque ecclesiae suae domos et
loca sepulcris apta sine inquietudine eos firmiter possidere praecipimus,
ea scilicet, quae ex diuturno tempore vel ex empto habuerunt vel quali-
bet quaesiverunt ratione. Sane providendum erit, ne quid sibi usurpare
conentur ex his, quae ante discidium ad ecclesiae perpetuae sanctitatis
pertinuisse manifestum est." Cod. Theod., xvi, 5, 2 (Sept. 25, 326).

^ Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum, iii, 7000. Cf. Eusebius, Life of
Cofistantine, iv, 37-39.

^ I Cor., vi, I -7.

* ' ' Judex pro sua sollicitudine observare debebit, ut, si ad episcopale
judicium provocetur, silentium accomodetur et, si quis ad legem Chris-
tianam negotium transferre voluerit et illud judicium observare, audia-
tur, etiamsi negotium apud judicem sit inchoatum, et pro Sanctis

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[42

A considerable body of humanitarian legislation shows
probably an increasing Christian influence upon Con-
stantine/ In his earlier rule in Gaul, though he was
extolled by his heathen panegyrist, Eumenius,^ as one so

habeatur, quidquid ab his fuerit judicatum: ita tamen, ne usu.rpetur in
eo, ut untis ex litigantibus pergat ad supra dictum auditorium et arbit-
rium suum enuntiet. Judex enim praesentis causae integre habere
debet arbitrium, ut omnibus accept© latis pronuntiet." Cod. Theod., i,
27, I (June 23, * * This law of Constantine's, though the absence
of one of the consuls' names leads to the year being omitted in the edi-
tion of Mommsen and Meyer, must have been issued about 326, as it is
dated at Constantinople, and Crispus was one of the consuls. The
building of Constantinople could hardly have been begun much before
this, and Crispus was executed that year.

Cf. also Constitutiones Sirmondianae for law of May 5, 333. " * * ^
Itaque quia a nobis instrui voluisti, olim. proniulgatae legis ordinem
salubri rursus imperio propagamus. Sanximus namque, sicut edicti
nostri forma declarat, sententias episcoporum quolibet genere latas sine
aliqua aetatis discretione inviolatas semper incorruptasque servari;
scilicet ut pro Sanctis semper ac venerabilibus habeantur, quidquid
episcoporum fuerit sententia terminatum. Sive itaque inter minores
sive inter majores ab episcopis fuerit judicatum, apud vos, qui judici-
orum summam tenetis, et apud ceteros omnes judices ad exsecutionem.
volumus pertinere. Quicumque itaque litem habens, sive possessor
sive petitor vel inter initia litis vel decursis temporum curriculis, sive
cum negotium peroratur, sive cum jam coeperit promi sententia, judi-
cium elegerit sacrosanctae legis antistitis, ilico sine aliqua dubitatione,
etiamsi alia pars refragatur, ad episcopum personae litigantium dirigan-
tur. Multa enim, quae in judicio captiosa praescriptionis vincula promi
non patiuntur, investigat et publicat sacrosanctae religionis auctoritas.
Omnes itaque causae, quae vel praetorio jure vel civili tractantur, epis-
coporum sententius terminatae perpetuo stabilitatis jure firmentur, nec
liceat ulterius retractari negotium, quod episcoporum sententia deci-
derit. Testimonium etiam ab uno licet episcopo perhibitum omnis
judex indubitanter accipiat nec alius audiatur testis, cum testimonium
episcopi a qualibet parte fuerit repromissum," etc. Cod. Theod., ed.,
Mommsen and Meyer, vol. i, part 2, pp. 907-908.

^ For other contributing factors, cf. A. C. McGifTert, " The Influence
of Christianity on the Roman Empire," Harvard Theological Review,
ii, pp. 28-49 (Jan., 1909)-

'In 310, Paneg., chap. 14, Migne: Patrologia Latinae, viii, col. 633
-(In Paneg. Vet. this is Paneg., no. vii).

43] CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS 43

formed by nature and rearing that he could not be cruel,
he is pictured as ending barbarian wars by the execution
of captured kings and the wholesale destruction of pris-
oners in gladiatorial shows.' In his later career, how-
ever, he legislated against gladiatorial shows, ^ and in
favor of better treatment of prisoners. ^ He also com-
manded milder treatment of slaves than was customary
in earlier laws, and encouraged their manumission.'^
Branding of criminals, for instance, was to be upon the
hand, so that the face, made in the image of heavenly
beauty, should not be marred. In the laws of the years
319 and 326, dealing with slavery, the distinction made
between the death of a slave through cruelty and abuse
and his death resulting from punishment of misconduct
is the decisive note and an improvement over previous
legislation, even though the law expressly exempted the
master from penalty in the latter instance. ^ There were
edicts issued also in favor of widows and orphans and
the poor,^ edicts encouraging the freeing of slaves, and

^ Ibid., chaps. 10, \i; hicerti Paneg . (Treves, 313) , chap. 23; in Migne,
P. L., viii, col. 622 et seq.; 670-671 resp.

' " Cruenta spectacula in otio civili et domestica quiete non placet.
Quapropter, qui omnino gladiatores esse prohibemus eos, qui forte
delictorum causa hanc condicionem adque sententiam mere.ri consue-
verant, metallo magis facies inservire, ut sine sanguine suorum scelerum
poenas agnoscant." Cod. Theod., xv, 12, i (Oct. i, 325). Cf. Euse-
bius, Life of Constantine , iv, 25,

^Cod. Theod., ix, 3, i (320); ix, 3, 2 (326); xi, 7, 3 (320).

^Cod. Theod., ii, 8, i (321); iv, 7, i (321); iv,8, 5 (322), and 6 (323).

'''Cod. Theod., ix, 12, i (May 11, 319); and 2 (April 18, 326). Cf.
Seeck: Unterga^ig, etc., i, 468, 478.

^Cod. Theod., \, 22,2 (June 17, 334); iii, 30, i (Mar. 26, 314) ; 2 (Feb.
3, 3i6[323]); 3 (Mar. 15, 326); 4 (Aug. i, 331); 5 (April 18, 333); ix,
21, 4 (May 4, 329); ix, 42, i (Feb. 27, 321). Cf. Eusebius, Life of
Constantirie, i, 43, 2; iv, 28. Athanasius Apologia contra Arium, 18.

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[44

forbidding the exposing of children to get rid of
them.'

Constantine also issued a number of laws against im-
morality and immoral religious rites, laws providing for
and regulating the punishment of adultery, and a law
prohibiting the custom of concubinage,^ at that time not
generally condemned by public sentiment outside the
church. These laws may reasonably be inferred to be
in sympathy, at least, with the opinion of Christian
leaders and advisers of the emperor.

An interesting and apparently specifically Christian
turn is found in some laws directed against the Jews.
One edict early in Constantine's reign decrees that
Jews or their elders or patriarchs who stone a convert
to Christianity (ad Dei cultum) or otherwise maltreat
him shall be burned, with all their associates in the act.^

^Cod. Theod., v, 9, i (April 17, 331); xi, 27, i (May 13, 315), 2 (July
6, 322).

^The law of 326 (de concub., Cod. Just., v, 26, i), forbids a man to
have a concubine if his wife is alive. Cf. D. S. Schaf¥, '* Concubinage "
(Christian), in Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, iii, 817 (1911).
Ct. P. Meyer, Der romische Konkubinat, (1895).

Cod. Theod., i, 22, i (Jan. 11, 316); ii, 17, i (April 9, 321 [324]);
iii, 16, I (331); iv, 6, 2 (April 29, 336) This law, however, was aimed
especially at the illegitimate son of Licinius. iv, 6, 3 (July 21, 336); 8, 7
(Feb. 28, 331); 12, I [= II, I Haenel] (April i, 314); 12, 4 [= 11, 5
Haenel] (Oct. 6, 331); ix, i, i (Dec. 4, 316-7); 7, 2 (April 25, 326);
8, I (April 4, 326 [?]); 9, i (May 29, 326); 24, i (April i, 320); 38, i
(Oct. 30, 322); xii, I, 6 (July i, 319).

Judaeis et majoribus eorum et patriarchis volumus intimari, quod,
si quis post banc legem aliquem qui eorum feralem fugerit sectam et ad
dei cultum respexerit, saxis aut alio furoris genere, quod nunc fieri cog-
novimus, ausus fuerit adtemptare, mox flammis dedendus est et cum
omnibus suis participibus concremandus. i. Si quis vero ex populo ad
eorum nefariam sectam accesserit et conciliabulis eorum se adplicaverit,
cum ipsis poenas meritas sustinebit." Cod. Theod., xvi, 8, i (Oct. 18,
315).

A later injunction against Jew s molesting in any way converts to

45]

CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS

Another law forbade a Jew to hold a Christian in
servitude.'

Any fair summary of Constantine's legislation during
the period of his sole emperorship, that is, during the
last thirteen years of his life, would show that it was
more favorable to Christianity than his earlier legislation,
and more alien to paganism. Much of it seems specific-
ally Christian. None of Constantine's later laws justify
the theory of Burckhardt, that to the last he remained
disposed to balance favors to the Christians with con-
cessions to the pagan element. The law quoted by
Burckhardt in favor of certain sacerdotales and fiamines
perpetiii in Africa, seems merely to guarantee the contin-
uance of their legal and social privileges even after they
had ceased to perform any religious functions.

2. Coinage

The extant coinage of Constantine is considerable,
even after deducting a large number of spurious coins
and medals.3 Many of his coins bear pagan symbols and

Christianity is given in Cod. Theod., xvi, 8, 5 (Oct. 22, 335), " Eum,
qui ex Judaeo Christianus factus est, inquietare Judaeos non liceat vel
aliqua pulsare injuria, pro qualitate commissi istiusmodi contumelia
punienda."

' Cod. Theod., xvi, 9, i (Oct. 21, 335). Eusebius, Life of Constantine,
iv, 27. For another law directed tovi^ard the Jews, cf. Cod. Theod.,
xvi, 8, 3 (Dec. II, 321).

"'Sacerdotales et flamines perpetuos atque etiam duumvirales ab
annonarum praeposituris inferioribusque muneribus inmunes esse prae-
cipimus. Quod ut perpetua observatione firmetur, legem hanc incisam
aeneis tabulis jussimus publicare." Cod. Theod., xii, 5, 2 (May 21,
337). Cf. Aurel. Victor, Caesars, 40. Cf. also, Schultze, Zeitsch. f.
K. G., vii, p. 369, where it is shown that men of these orders openly
declared themselves in inscriptions to be Christians.

'For full discussion see Jules Maurice, Numismatique Constantini-
enne, vol. i, 1908, still in progress, and H. Cohen: Description des
Monnaies f rappees sous V Empire romai?t, communiment appelies

CONSTANTIKE AXD CHRISTIANITY

[46

inscriptions such as Soli Invicti Comiti," though the
estimate of these by Burckhardt ^ and others seems to be
a gross exaggeration. "Hercules conservator," "Mars
conservator," ''Victoria," and similar dedications occur
more or less frequently.^ The title ''Pontifex Maximus "
occasionally occurs, sometimes with a veiled figure repre-
senting Constantine as such. But inferences from this must
not be carried too far, for succeeding Christian emperors
also bore the title.

On the other hand some coins show Constantine look-
ing up as if in prayer. ^ These coins first appear about
325. They correspond in a general way with Eusebius'
reference to them as tokens of the emperor's constant
practice of prayer'^ and miay be understood as an in-
dication of Constantine's professed piety. ^ Coins and
medals, one minted at Constantinople, with Constantine's
name, and the reverse shov/ing a veiled figure in a four-
horse chariot ascending toward a hand outstretched from
above need not necessarily be taken as a reflection of

Medailles imperiales edited and continued by Feuardent, 8 vols., second
ed., Paris, 1880-1892. For list of older discussions, cf. Richardson's
bibliography in A^zV^w^ and Post-Nicene Fathers, second series, vol. i, p.
445 et seq. For shorter discussions see Schiller: Geschichte der romischen
Kaiserzeit, vol. ii, 207, 219; O. Seeck in Zeitschrift fur Numismatiky xxi
(1898), pp. 17-65, and Schultze in Zeitsch. f. K. G., xiv (1894), PP-
S04-510.

* Zeit Const, d. G., p. 371, "Soli Invicti Comiti" on four out of
five.

^Grisar, in Zeitsch. f. Kath. TheoL, vi, p. 600 seq., maintains that
many of these figures generally assumed to be gods are mere personi-
fications of Constantine's greatness and victories, and cites one of them
vv^hich has on the reverse an indubitable Christian emblem.

'For prints of these see Cohen, op. cit., vii, pp. 240, 256, 311, 400.

^ Life of Constantine, iv, 15.

^Schultze, in Zeitsch. f. K. G., xiv (1894), p. 504 et seq.

CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS 47

Elijah's translation.' They may represent the apotheosis
of the emperor, as similar coins are said to have been
made for his father, Constantius, who was not a Chris-
tian.

Schiller's summary of Constantine's coinage is sug-
gestive, and the gradual development which he finds
seems justified, though his insistence upon the ambiguity
of signs generally accepted as Christian betrays a strong
bias in favor of his theory that Constantine tried to
straddle between Christianity and paganism. He shows
that in Constantine's western mints coins ^ appear with
Mars, genius pop. Rom. and with Sol invictus', that
the first two ceased in 315 or earlier, and that the
last disappeared, perhaps by 315, at any rate before 323.
Coins with Juppiter stamped on them were not issued
in the west but in the east from the mints of Licinius.
Gradually non-commital legends, such as Beata tran-
quillitas took the place of pagan inscriptions. Finally
coins with the monogram were issued, and toward
the end of Constantine's life series were issued showing
soldiers bearing the labarum with this monogram.

3. Inscriptions

Two inscriptions have been the center of controversy
in connection with Constantine's position in religious
matters, one on his triumphal arch at Rome, and the
other at a building in Hispellum.

The middle panels of the attic, on both the north and
the south side of the Arch of Constantine, above the

^ See Schultze.

Roman imperial coinage usually bore a well-defined clue to the mint
that put it out.

^ In some instances this was a sign of the mint. For this sign, cf.
infra, p. ^^ et seq.

48 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

central passageway, bear the following dedicatory in-
scription :

IMP . CAES . FL . CONSTANTINO MAXIMO
P . F . AVGVSTO . S . P . Q . R .
QVOD INSTINCTV DIVINITATIS MENTIS
MAGNITVDINECVM EXERCITV S VO
TAM DETYRANNO QVAM DE OMNI EIVS
FACTIONEVNOTEMPOREIVSTIS
REMPVBLICAMVLTVSEST ARMIS
ARCVM TRIVMPHIS INSIGNEM DICAVIT

or in full, modern form :

" Imp(eratori) Caes(ari) F(lavio) Constantino Maximo
P(io) F(elici) Augusto S(enatus) P(opulus) q(ue)
R(omanus) quod instinctu divinitatis mentis magni-
tudine cum exercitu suo tarn de tyranno quam de omni
eius factione uno tempore iustis rempublicam ultus est
armis arcum triumphis insignem dicavit." This may be
translated : " To the Emperor, Caesar Flavius Con-
stantius Maximus, Pius, Felix, Augustus, inasmuch as
by his divine inspiration and his great mind, with the
help of his army, he has justly avenged the republic at
the same time upon the tyrant and upon his entire party,
the Senate and the Roman People do dedicate this arch
notable for triumphs."

This inscription, commemorating the victory over
Maxentius (312J, is almost universally assigned to the
year 315, the date of Constantine's assumption of the
title Maximus. The arch is generally believed to have
been erected between 312 and 315, in large part out of
materials taken from other monumental works, especially
from works of Trajan and other emperors of the second
century. The theory that the arch was constructed in
Trajan's time and worked over for Constantine's benefit
has been advocated at various times. Strong arguments
against this theory were advanced by such authorities as

CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS 49

Bunsen ' and Nibby.^ De Rossi, also, who made a care-
ful examination in 1863, when Napoleon III had plaster
casts made of parts of the arch, reported that the dedi-
catory inscription quoted above was carved in marble
blocks, which were an integral part of the structure
itself, and that there was every indication that it was the
original and the only inscription ever carved there.^
Lanciani, after examination of the staircase and rooms
in the attic, pronounced the inside of the structure to be
built with a great variety of materials taken from monu-
ments belonging to the Fabii and to the Arruntii. He
pronounced the bricks, however, contemporary with
Constantine. ^

Recently, A. L. Frothingham, whose Monuments of
Christian Rome (1908) described the arch as erected
in the time of Constantine, has argued that it was
originally erected in the time of Domitian, that it was
afterwards undedicated " and mutilated, that it was used
in the third century as a sort of imperial "triumphal
bulletin-board," and that its "Odyssey" ended with its
final dedication to Constantine.^ He bases his new
opinion (i) on the well-know frequency with which
Domitian had arches erected; (2) on the bas-relief from
the mausoleum of the Haterii showing an unidentified
monument where the Arch of Constantine now stands —
between the Arch of Titus and the Colosseum, and facing
the latter; (3) on the decree of memoriae da^nnatio
passed against Domitian after his death ; (4) on the fact

^ Beschreibung der Stadt Rom (1837), vol. iii, part i.
''Roma 7ielVanno MDCCCXXXVIII (1838), part i, p. 443 et seq.
^ Bullettino di Archeologia cristiana del Cav. G. B. de Rossi (Rome) ,
I, No. 7 (July, 1863); No. 8 (Aug., 1863), Miscellaneous (1863).
The Ruins and Excavations of Ancient Rome (1897), pp. 191-192.
^Century Magazine, vol. Ixxxv, pp. 449-455 (Jan., 1913).

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

that triumphs were granted and arches built for victories
over foreign foes alone, not for victories in civil wars ;
(5) on the phrase in the inscription quoted above,
*' arcum triumphis insignem dicavit," which he translates,
" do dedicate herewith . . . this arch, famous for its
triumphs ; " (6) on his belief that the set of eight medal-
lions over the smaller passageways representing hunting
scenes are in the style of Domitian and were part of the
original decoration, while the rest of the ornamentation
was inserted later; (7) and on the "series of eight
niches with half-figures of emperors being crowned by
victories" under the two smaller arcades. This argu-
ment as a whole seems plausible, but is by no means
convincing. The connection of the first three points
with the Arch of Constantine is purely speculative, the
second one being also weakened by the fact that the un-
identified arch on the Haterian bas-relief, which Froth-
ingham identifies as an arch of Domitian later converted
into the Arch of Constantine, plainly represents a struc-
ture with openings on all four sides (quadrafrons) afford-
ing passageway not only from north to south, but from
east to west ; quite a different structure from the one we
are considering. The fourth point, while well taken, is
not conclusive ; there may well have been exception in
the fourth century, and the argument would tell as
effectively against the dedication of an old triumphal
arch as against the erection of a new one. The fifth,
sixth and seventh points involve question of interpreta-
tion of literary and archaeological evidence, in which the
weight of opinion is against Mr. Frothingham. More-
over, the history of the arch as he reconstructs it would
certainly be unique in the Roman empire, involving more
difficulties than does the generally accepted account.'
' For the Arch of Constantine, in addition to the works cited above,

3 1 ] CONSTANTIXE'S LA WS AND WRITINGS 5 1

Our interest, however, is in the dedicatory inscription.
It will be seen that this ascribes Constantine's victory
partly to his army, but primarily to the prompting of
divinity and his greatness of mind, Instinctu Divinitatis
Mentis Magnitudine." The phrase is colorless and ab-
solutely indecisive as between paganism and Christianity.
It does not even necessarily refer to any special mani-
festation of providence, pagan or Christian. Victories
have in all times been ascribed to divine favor irre-
spective of the religion involved and even of the circum-
stances of the battle. Constantine's earlier triumphs in
Gaul had long before this been ascribed by pagan pane-
gyrists to something like " instinctus divinitatis, mentis
magnitudo."' The monotheism of the conqueror may be
inferred from the inscription, since if Constantine had
been a pagan of the old type there would prou^.b^/ have
been specific reference to Jupiter, Apollo or some other
pagan deity. One would infer, also, that he was not at
this time a zealous Christian, nor thought to be such,
otherwise some distinctively Christian phrase would have
been used. It is possible, however, that the indefinite-
ness of the phrase represents the thought of the pagan
Senate rather than the emperor's attitude.

The matter has been complicated by the theory that
"instinctu divinitatis " was not the original inscription,
but a correction carved later over the original phrase.

cf. Jordan, Topographic ' der Stadt Rom im Altertum, ed. Huelsen
(Berlin, 1907), vol. i, part 3, pp. 45 et seq.; H. Grisar, Geschichte
Rams (1901), vol. i, p. 172.; E. Petersen, Vom altem Rom (Leipsic,
1911) , p. 66 et seq.

Photographs of the Arch and other reproductions have been fre-
quently published. Detailed descriptions with excellent photographic
reproductions are given by J. Leufkens in Konstaniin der Crosse u.
seine Zeit, ed. by Dolger, pp. 161-216, and plates iii, iv, v, vi.

* Cf. infra, p. 131 et seq.

52 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [52

It has even been asserted that the original inscription
was " NVTV. 1. O. M.," " at the nod of Jupiter Optimus
Maximus."' This theory, however, seems utterly unten-
able. The spacing of the inscription would be very
peculiar, indeed, if such a phrase had really been a part
of it, and close study of the attic of the Arch seems to
afford no grounds for assuming that the inscription ever
contained other words than are now to be seen in it. ^

In the ruins of a building in the little Umbrian city of
Hispellum an inscription ^ recites that the emperor
granted a petition for the erection of a temple in honor
of the gens Flavia to which he belonged, for the celebra-
tion there of certain festal performances with the stipu-
lation that the temple was not to be polluted with the
frauds of tainted superstition, " ne aedis nostro nomini
dedicata cuiusquam contagiosae superstitionis fraudibus
polluatur. " In spite of Burckhardt's opinion to the con-
trary, ^ this probably meant the prohibition of pagan rites,
and the building was intended apparently, not as a place
of worship, but as a place for game and other celebrations,
including, it must be admitted, gladiatorial shows. ^

A third inscription ^ shows that privileges were given
to localities on account of all their inhabitants being

^ For full assertion of this theory and references, see Burckhardt,
Zeit Co7istantins d. Grossen, pp. 343-344, 475-6.

2 Cf. supra, p. 49; also Seeck, Gesch. d. Untergangs der antiken
Welt., i, p. 491; Dessau, 694; Keim, Der Uebertritt Constantins, d. G.
zum Chrisientum.

^Ascribed to 336-337 A. D., Dessau 705; Orelli 5580; printed in
Muratori Inscr. iii p. 1791 as spurious, but now generally accepted as
genuine.

*Zeit Constantins d. G. p. 382.

^Cf. Seeck: Gesch. d. Untergangs d. a^ttiken Welt, i, 471.
^ C. I. L, iii 7000 " quibus omnibus quasi quidam cumulus accedit
quod omnes ibidem sectatores sanctissimae religionis habitare dicantur. "

CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS 53

adherents of (our) most sacred religion. " Taken
with Eusebius' account' of special honor being shown
Gaza and a town in Phoenicia on the same ground, this
is proof of the emperor's active interest in, and associa-
tion with Christianity after he became sole emperor.

4. Writi7tgs

Aside from coins and inscriptions a considerable body
of direct evidence on Constantine's religion has been
preserved, chiefly by Eusebius, in the form of speeches
and letters attributed to him.^ The longest of these is
the Easter sermon, or Oration of the Emperor Con-
stantine to the Assembly of the Saints," which Eusebius
appended to his Life of Constantine as a sample of the
discourses which he says Constantine was in the habit
of delivering to the court and even to the public. ^ This
is held by Schultze,^ chiefly on the ground of contra-
dictions which it involves to Eusebius' narrative, and
some close, even verbal resemblances to Lactantius, to
be not a speech of the emperor's, but some Latin docu-
ment copied by Eusebius. Since Eusebius did not hear
the speech and was only at rare intervals at the court,^
such a mistake was within the realm of possibility. But
I am inclined to think that its obvious dependence upon
Lactantius and its variations from Eusebius' own state-
ments,^ do not militate against the speech being Con-

^ Life of Constantine, iv, 37, 38.

'•^For lists, with comments, see Richardson's "Prolegomena" in
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, vol. i, Eusebius, pp.
436-439. Cf. also infra, p. 109 et seq. For imperfect and uncritical
edition of Constantine's Works, cf. Migne, P. L., vol. viii, 93-581.
Life of Constantine, iv, 29-32.
^Zeitsch. f. K. G., viii (1886), p. 541 et seq.
^ Life of Constantine, iv, 33; 39; 46.
Eg. Lactantius, Divine Institutes, i, 4-7, iv, 18-19, and Constantine,

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[54

stantine's. Lactantius, as the tutor of the emperor's
sons and a member of his household, probably influ-
enced his religious conceptions as much as any one else,
certainly more than Eusebius. Constantine may well
not only have read his writings, but also have used them
without acknowledgment in his speeches. Indeed, Lac-
tantius may have written the speech for the emperor to
deliver.

Many letters purporting to be Constantine's have been
preserved, some in Eusebius' Church History, more in
his Life of Constantine, and a few elsewhere. Those
whose genuineness is practically unquestioned, and those
which are in doubt, do not vary greatly in tone. They
are characterized by a loose, difficult style, in many cases
made worse by translation from Latin into Greek.' If
we restrict ourselves to those whose genuineness there
is no reason for questioning, we get a picture of one on
terms of official intimacy with the leading bishops, writ-
ing as one personally interested in the welfare of the
church, and as a believer in its teachings. From a theo-
logical point of view they expound a somewhat vague

Oration to the Saints, chaps, xviii-xxi, maintain that the Sibyl and
other heathen sources foretold the Christian revelation and Christ,
while Eusebius, Oration in Praise of Co7isianiine, chap, ix, expressly
declared they did not.

^ Among the most important in Eusebius, not mentioned in the dis-
cussion of legislation, are the following: Church History, x, 5, 18-21;
21-24; Life of Consia7itine, ii, 46; 64-72; iii, 17-20; 30-32; 42; 52-53;
60; 61; 62; iv, 36. Athanasius gives several bearing on himself and the
Arian controversy; e. g. Apol. contra Ar., lix; Ix, Ixi; Ixii; Ixviii; Ixx;
Ixxxvi. Augustine, also, Ep., Ixxxviii. Gelasius of Cyzicus gives sev-
eral letters, the genuineness of which is open to question, in his History
of the Cou7icii of Nicea (in Labbe, Concilia, 2 (1671), pp. 103-286).
For a list of 44 letters, not including all the above and giving some
from other sources, cf. Richardson, Prolegomena, in Nicene and Post-
Nice7ie Fathers, Second Series, vol. i, Eusebius, pp. 436-439.

CONSTANTINE'S LAWS AND WRITINGS 55

monotheism linked rather clumsily to a revelation in
Christ which is represented in the organized church.
The Christian church, and Christians, are therefore the
representatives and the proteges of God. Immortality
is occasionally emphasized, but there is little attempt
after, or feeling for, those teachings and experiences,
which in all ages have constituted the highest types of
Christianity.

The most characteristic passages, varying phases of the
dominant note, are those in which Constantine speaks of
the favor of God as the source of his own great achieve-
ments and success. " I myself, then, was the instrument
whose services he chose, and esteemed suited for the ac-
complishment of his will. Accordingly, beginning at the
remote Brittanic ocean, through the aid of divine power
I banished and utterly removed every form of evil which
prevailed. " ' " But now that liberty is restored, and that
serpent, [Licinius, Constantine's brother-in-law] driven
from the administration of public afifairs by the provi-
dence of God, and our instrumentality, we must trust
that all can see the efficacy of the Divine power. " ^
" Under thy guidance have I devised and accomplished
measures fraught wuth blessings : preceded by the sacred
sign I have led thy armies to victory. * * * For thy
name I truly love, while I regard with reverence that
power of which thou has given abundant proofs, to the
confirmation and increase of my faith. " ^

^Eusebius : Life of Constantine, ii, 28, quoting Constantine.
Ibid ii, 46.

^ Ibid ii, 55 Cf. Oration of Constantine to the Assembly of the Saints,
(his Easter sermon) appended to the Life of Constantine, chap. 22, i;
chap. 26. Also Eusebius : Church History x, 7, i and 2.

CHAPTER III

IMPERIAL PATRONAGE OF CHRISTIANITY ; ATTITUDE TOWARD

PAGANISM

I. Church Building

Aside from legislation and other evidence already cited,
many phases of imperial patronage of religion are disclosed
by writers of Constantine's time. Thus, in the erection of
buildings, in the entourage of the court, and in the attitude
of contemporary Christian and pagan leaders, one can trace
the dominance of one or another religious influence.

Constantine followed the example of many of his prede-
cessors in erecting innumerable buildings. Early in his
career, in Gaul, he rebuilt the public structures of x\utun.^
Nazarius extolled his building as well as his restoration of
order in Rome immediately after the victory over Maxen-
tius.^ His friendly attitude toward Christianity was, there-
fore, naturally shown in the erection of churches. Eusebius
abounds in sweeping statements of wholesale erection of
Christian memorials, basilicas and churches throughout the
empire.^

Zosimus, the pagan historian, with characteristic spleen,
tells of his wasting public money on many useless buildings.

^ Cf. the panegyric of Eumenius (310) at Treves, chap. 22. and the
oration of formal thanks the following year, Migne, P. L., viii, cols.
639, 641.

^ Panegyricus of 321, Migne, P. L., viii, col. 605 ei seq. (chap. 33).
' Cf. Oration in Praise of Constantine, chaps. 9 et seq. ; Life of Con-
stantine, i, 42; ii, 45 and 46; iii, i, 47 and 50.

56 [56

IMPERIAL PATRONAGE OF CHRISTIANITY c^y

some of which were so badly constructed that they had to
be torn down. The Theodosian Code bears testimony to
his zeal for building, at the time of the rearing of many
structures in Constantinople, by his instructions for estab-
lishing schools of architecture/

Many important church structures were, beyond reason-
able doubt, built by him or through his influence, and by
members of his family.^ Most of our information about
churches built in the eastern part of the empire comes from
Eusebius' Life of Constantine. Aside from general state-
ments about the zeal of the emperor and of his mother,
Helena, in this cause the biographer refers specifically to
the following: the Church of the Sepulchre^ and its adja-
cent basilica, in Jerusalem; a church on the Mount of
Olives,* a basilica in Bethlehem ^ and at Mamre ; ^ a church
at Heliopolis,' at Antioch,^ at Nicomedia; ^ the Church of
the Twelve Apostles at Constantinople,^'^ in which Constan-
tine's own sepulchral monument was built Of most of
these Eusebius gives a glowing description, and in the case
of the Church of the Sepulchre at Jerusalem and the Church
of the Twelve Apostles at Constantinople, he gives a de-
tailed and elaborate account. These two, and the church at

2 Ciampini, De sacris aedificns a Constantino Magno constructis synopiis
historia, Rome, 1693, is still one of the chief sources of information
about these, though his identifications are not always accepted by mod-
ern archaeologists.

' iii, 25-40; cf. also Anonymi itinerarunv (Bordeaux pilgrim), A. D.
333, Migne, P. L., vol. viii, col. 791.

* iii, 41-43 ; cf. also Bordeaux pilgrim, loc. cit.

^ Ibid. Cf. Bordeaux pilgrim, col, 792.

*iii, 51-53; cf. also Bordeaux pilgrim, loc. cit.

' iii, 58. ^ iii, 50.

*Ibid. loiv, 58-60.

58 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [58

Antioch must have been magnificent and costly structures.
One of Eusebius' continuators, Socrates, who spent a large
part of his life in Constantinople, tells of another church
in that city named Irene (Peace), which he says Constan-
tine considerably enlarged and adorned/ It may origi-
nally have antedated Constantine at Byzantium, or may
have been built in the first instance by the emperor, perhaps
shortly after his victory over Licinius and the restoration
of peace to the empire.

Rome is the only city in the West in which the erection
of any particular churches can be assigned, on any consid-
erable historical evidence, to Constantine and his family.
Even here much is left uncertain. He unquestionably gave
the bishop at Rome at least the temporary use of the Lateran
palace, which had come into his possession through his
wife, Fausta. In 313 Bishop Miltiades presided there over
the well-known conference called at Constantine's direction
to settle the incipient Donatist schism in Africa. In con-
nection -with this palace, or out of part of it, Constantine
built the basilica (and adjacent baptistery) which, under
the name of the Lateran, was to becomie for centuries the
" mother and head of all the churches of the city and the
world." In early days it was called the Basilica of Con-
stantine (not to be confused with the great civil basilica
which, begun by Maxentius, w^as, after his defeat and death,
finished by his conqueror, and became the basilica of Con-
stantine), and in later days became St. John of the Lateran,
in honor of John the Baptist.^ No vestige of its original
features now remain.

^ Ecclesiastical History, ii, 16 ; i, 16, 2.

^On this church, cf. Lanciani, Ruins and Excavations of Ancient
Rome, pp. 339-343; Frothingham, Monuments of Christian Rome, p. 24.
Niebuhr, Vortrdge iiber alte L'dnden u. Vdlkerkunde, p. 399, accepted
Constantinian origin for the Lateran buildings alone. Gregorovius, Rome

IMPERIAL PATRONAGE OF CHRISTIANITY 59

In the case of the Lateran, as of other churches which
Constantine may have built or enlarged, the ecclesiastical
structure must have been overshadowed by the magnificent
buildings of ancient Rome with which it was surrounded.
The Notitia which was edited about 330 and which enumer-
ated the important public buildings of the city, did not
mention a single Christian Church/ Eusebius, in connec-
tion with Rome, mentions only Constantine's benefactions
to the churches ; he names no churches which he built there,
but refers only to his " enlarging and heightening " and
" embellishing " the sacred structures.^ Though Eusebius
wrote with only a distant knowledge of Rome, his state-
ment counts for something against the later extravagant
traditions of Constantine's church building at Rome. The
Liber PontiUcalis, also, which, though compiled more than
two hundred years after Constantine, embodied informa-
tion from earlier documents, while it is full of descriptions
of lavish embellishments and endowments, gives only a
very modest list of churches as of Constantinian origin.^

Another palace within the city walls, the Sessorian, ap-
parently furnished room for an ecclesiastical structure by
the conversion of its main hall into a church. This was
the Jerusalem church, and later became the " Holy Cross
in Jerusalem" {Santa Croce in Gernsalemme), from the

in the Middle Ages, i, pp. 88-95, after naming seven churches which
tradition ascribes to Constantine, added : " We can ascertain nothing
definite of these buildings ; and perhaps St. John Lateran alone owes
its origin to the Emperor."

' Cf. Frothingham, Monuments of Christian Rome, p. 31.

^ Life of Constantine, i, 42.

' Cf. the account it gives of Sylvester's pontificate. Cf. also Du-
chesne's discussion in the introduction of his edition of the Lib. Pont.,
vol. i, p. cxl et seq.

6o CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [60

preservation in it of the principal relic of the True Cross.^
A parish church inside the old city, that of Equitius, after-
wards 5^6'. Silvestro e Martino ai Monti, is claimed by the
Liber Pontificalis for the episcopate of Sylvester, Constan-
tine's contemporary, and its remains are so assigned by
many archaeologists.^ If this be correct it was probably one
of the beneficiaries of the emperor's generosity, even
though the bishop of Rome was its builder.

Outside the walls, according to the Liber Pontificalis, 2l
large basilica of St. Peter was erected (on the Vatican
Hill), a smaller basilica of St. Paul (on the Via Ostiensis),
a basilica of St. Lawrence (on the Via Tiburtina), a basilica
of St. Agnes (on the Via Nomentana), and one of SS.
Marcellinus and Peter (on the Via Praenestina). The
mausoleum of Constantina (incorrectly called Constantia)
near the basilica of St. Agnes, was apparently used as the
baptistery of the latter and should therefore be included
in the list.^ While it is by no means certain that all of these
buildings owed their origin to Constantine, his family, or
pontiffs contemporary with him, such is the very general
opinion of archaeologists and of church historians.* It is
probable also that these and other churches received some,
if by no means all, of the ornaments and endowments which
later were described in such detail in the Liber Pontificalis.
Though tradition has doubtless exaggerated the extent of
Constantine's building, adorning and endowing of churches,

* C/. Frothingham, op. cit., p. 24; Lanciani, op. ext., pp. 397 et seq.
2 Frothingham, op. cit., pp. 22-23.

' For a short account of all these buildings, cf. Frothingham, op. cit.,
pp. 24-31.

*For short summaries of Constantine's church building, cf. W. R.
Lethaby and C. H. Turner, in Cambridge Medieval History, vol. i, pp.
609-611, and 158 respectively. The argument that Constantine was at
Rome only at long intervals and for short stays does not, as is some-
times assumed, prove that he did not order extensive building there.

5i] IMPERIAL PATRONAGE OF CHRISTIANITY 6l

it is not too much to say that he was in this regard not only
the earliest, but one of the most profuse of imperial patrons
of the church.

2. Constantine's Actions at Rome

In the campaign against Maxentius, Constantine made
use of the cross and the monogram among his military in-
signia, perhaps as a result of a dream/ After his entry
into Rome he is said to have erected in the city a statue of
himself holding a cross in his hand, and inscribed with the
following phrases, " By this salutary sign, the true proof
of bravery, I have saved and freed your city from the yoke
of the tyrant," etc.~ These references in Eusebius are our
only evidences and they have been questioned,^ but their
repetition by him in different circumstances, especially in
the Church History and in the oration at Tyre in 314, has
something of cumulative evidence. The probability of such
a statue being erected is great, and is increased by the fact
that Maxentius declared hostilities by overthrowing and
defacing statues of Constantine at Rome.* I am therefore
inclined to accept Eusebius' statements.

The honor of apotheosis granted to Diocletian (soon
after 313) probably by the Senate, is sometimes cited as
evidence that Constantine was not a Christian at this time,^
but not much weight ought to be attached to it. Rome was

* For discussion of stories of Constantine's conversion in this connec-
tion, cf. infra, pp. 78 et seq.; 135 et seq.

2 Eusebius, Church History, ix, 9, 10; 11; x, 4, 16; Oration in Praise
of Constantine, ix, 9, 18; Life of Constantine, i, 40.

Cf. Brieger in Zeitsch. f. K. G. (1880), p. 45.

* Nazarius, Panegyricus (321), chap. 12.

^ Cf. Burckhardt, Zcit Constantins d. G., p. 345. This was the last
time this was done in the old pagan sense.

62 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [62

Still strongly pagan ; the act was very natural, and probably
a mere formality.

On the other hand, Constantine, in the latter part of his
reign, during his last visit to Rome, seems to have taken a
definite stand against public ceremonies which involved
recognition of the old gods. He refused on this occasion
to lead the military procession of the equestrian order and
present himself before the Jupiter of the Capitoline hill.^
Something of a riot is said to have resulted from his de-
fiance of the public sentiment which supported the cere-
mony.

3. Personal Favor Shown Churchmen and the Church

Of great significance is the unquestioned fact that Con-
stantine employed (317) a Christian rhetorician, the well-
known writer Lactantius, as the tutor of his sons, especially
Crispus. All of his children were given a distinctively
Christian education and the sons who succeeded him in im-
perial power carried out a decisively Christian policy in the
government.^

Christian bishops were continually present at Constan-
tine's court after 312. Hosius, bishop of Cordova in Spain,
may have been with him in his campaign against Maxen-
tius; he certainly accompanied him on an expedition later,
and seems to have been very influential at court.^ Euse-
bius of Nicomedia for many years enjoyed the favor of the
emperor as well as that of his family. Eusebius of Cae-
sarea delighted to recount expressions of royal appreciation

^ Zosimus, ii, 29. Though Zosimus is not always a reliable source,
there is no reason to reject this story. Cf. infra, p. 63, n. 6.

2 Cod. Theod., xvi, 10, 2 and 4. Cf. Boyd, op. cit., pp. 21-23. See also
Eusebius, Life of Constantine, iv, 52. For Lactantius, cf. Jerome, de
Vir. III., 80.

' Eusebius, Church History, x, 6, 2 ; Life of Constantine, ii, 63 ; Soc-
rates, i, 2, i; Athanasius, Apol. c. Ar., 75.

IMPERIAL PATRONAGE OF CHRISTIANITY , 63

which he received at his appearance before Constantine
and in letters from him/ At the Council of Nicea the em-
peror showered attentions upon the bishops, and especially
upon those who had suffered during the persecutions.^
Making- all allowance for exaggerations by Eusebius and
other ecclesiastics who were dazzled by the eminence thus
given them, the direct patronage bestowed upon the church
and upon many leading churchmen must have been ex-
ceedingly liberal. Ammianus Marcellinus complained of
his disorganizing the post service by giving Christian
bishops free use of it in attending councils.^

He granted public money to various clergymen and
churches,* and spent large sums on church buildings.'^ So
far as we know he took little or no part during his later life
in pagan ceremonies.''

4. Attitude Toward Paganism
Reports of the destruction of pagan temples by Constan-
tine's orders and of his approval of their destruction by the
people come down to us from nearly all sources. Most, if
not all of these, refer to the last ten years of his life. Some

Life of Constantine, iv, 33-36; 46; iii, 61.
^ Ibid., iii, 15, 22. Cf. also Theodoret, i, ii, i.
''xxi, 16, 18.

* Eusebius, Church History, x, 6, Constantine's letter to Cecilian,
bishop of Carthage, informing him of an appropriation, and authoriz-
ing him to draw on the treasury.

5 Cf. supra, p. 56 et seq.

® For his refusal to take part in the military procession of the eques-
trian order to offer public vows to Jupiter on the Capitoline Hill,
cf. supra, p. 62. Zosimus elsewhere affirms that Constantine
tolerated heathen rites, and even took part in them (ii, 29, 3), but
his statements to that effect in part refer to the earlier years of Con-
stantine, in part are trivial, and are always under the suspicion of ex-
treme partisanship. It can readily be seen that entire removal of pagan
elements in all public ceremonies or absolute refusal to participate in
such unpurified occasions would in any case be difficult and unnecessary
as well as impolitic.

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[64

such cases may be traced to a desire to suppress immoral
and licentious rites, a feeling not limited to the Christians.^
Some were doubtless due to the necessity of replenishing
Constantine's notoriously disordered treasury, though Euse-
bius maintains that the removal of gold, silver and brass
ornaments and coverings of statues was effected in order
to expose the bare w^ood to the derision of the multitude.^
But though the motive was avarice, the process shows no
friendship for paganism. Many statues, also, and other
ornaments were removed from heathen temples for the
beautification of the new city of Constantinople.^ Not
only were repairs stopped on old temples, but many such
buildings must have been demolished and their materials
used for other purposes. There can be no doubt but that
the emperor's attitude greatly encouraged the process of
the destruction of pagan antiquity.* Though no general
law for the destruction of pagan temples has come down
to us from this time, a law of Constans presupposes the
gradual destruction of such edifices during the last years of
Constantine's reign.^

Constantine's pro-Christian and anti-Pagan policy, how-
ever, does not seem to have been so pronounced as to make

^ Eg., the shrine of the heavenly goddess at Aphaca on Lebanon about
330 (Eusebins, Life of Constantine, iii, 55) ; and the temple at Heliop-
olis, supplanted by a church liberally supplied with almsmoney (ibid.,
chap. 58).

^ Eusebius, Life of Constantine, iii, 54 and 57, copied from his Ora-
tion in Praise of Constantine, ch. 8. It may be noted that in chapter
54 Eusebius says this was done not by military force, but by a few of
the emperor's own friends. This looks like m.ercenary pillage.

3 Cf. infra, pp. 65-66.

*C/. Eusebius, Life of Constantine, iii, 54-58; cf. Lanciani, The De-
struction of Pagan Rome (1903), pp. 30 et seq.

5 Cod. Theod., ix, 17, Cf. also Eunapius, Vita Aedes, 37, ed., Boise-
sonade, Amsterdam, 1822.

65] IMPERIAL PATRONAGE OF CHRISTIANITY 65

an open and sharply-defined break. Eusebius himself after
summarizing his legislation for the relief of Christians in
the west between 312 and 323 adds, " But his munificence
bestowed still further and more numerous favors on the
heathen peoples and the other nations in his empire. So
that the inhabitants of our regions [the East] with one
consent proclaimed their own happiness," etc} Pagans
continued in the court of Constantine up to the very last^
Yet a story has been preserved of a heathen philosopher,
Kanonaris, executed for persistent denunciation of Con-
stantine's destruction of the old religion.* We are told,
also, through Eunapius, Zosimus and Suidas, concerning
Sopater, a neoplatonist friend of the emperor's or possibly
a magician, who vv^as executed at Constantinople after 330.
According to one version this was on the accusation of
keeping back by magic the Egyptian grain ships. It ma}^
have been brought about by a court intrigue of the Chris-
tian faction.*

There are even some reports of pagan elements in the
buildings and dedicatory exercises of Constantinople.
Burckhardt ^ has emphasized the following: Glycas ^ tells
of an astronomer Valens brought there to cast the horo-
scope of the new city. Sopater, also, is said to have per-
formed mystic symbols as a magician." There are also re-

^ Life of Constantine, i\, 22.

* For one of the " self-imagined philosophers " ; cf. Eusebius, Life of
Constantine, iv, 55.

3 Burckhardt, Zeit Constantins d. G., p. 447, on basis of "Anonymus "
in Banduri, Imperium orientale, p. 98.

* Cf. Zosimus, ii, 40,

^ Zeit Constantins d. G., pp. 382, 480 ct seq.

^ Chronicle, part iv. A poor source, from the twelfth century or later.
^ This on basis of Joannes Lydus, De Mensibus, iv, 2.

66 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [66

ports of the erection of heathen temples to the Divine
Mother, to Castor and Pollux, and to Tyche, and of the
performance of an annual ceremony in which the image of
Tyche figured.^ On the face of the evidence, however, the
first two seem very uncertain, while the temples seem to
have been monumental structures built to hold statuary,
without any cults connected with them, and the ceremonies
were probably without any religious significance whatever.^
The friendliness of Christian writers to Constantine and
the hostility of subsequent pagan writers is of itself almost
conclusive evidence that he took his stand openly with the
former. That he had some pagan panegyrists, especially
early in his reign, is to be accounted for by the fact that
only later did he assume Christianity, and then only gradu-
ally.^ That there was little or no specifically pagan oppo-
sition to him during his life is explained by the fact that
pagan leaders do not seem to have been aware that the issue
between the two religions was being permanently decided
in that generation. It could not have been seen until the
reign of Julian that the attitude of one emperor could be so
decisive or that a future restoration of paganism was for-
ever out of the question. Diocletian's persecution had not
only failed to destroy the church, but it had failed to per-
suade earnest supporters of pagan religions that Christian-
ity was dangerous to them. However, with Julian's unsuc-
cessful attempt to turn the tide back to paganism, there
came a change so noticeable that Bury uses it as one basis

^ On the basis of Zosimus, ii, 31; Philostorgius, ii, 17; Sozomen, v, 4,
and Chronicon Paschale, ad. ann. 330.

2C/. Grisar, Zeitsch. f. Kath. TheoL, vi (1882), pp. 587 et seq., and
Strzygowski in A?ialecta Graeciensia (Graz., 1893).

' Cf. Eusebius, Life of Constantine, ii, 23, 47.

6;] IMPERIAL PATRONAGE OF CHRISTIANITY 67

for determining the date of pagan writings/ Those who
were most in earnest about paganism were thereafter apt
to be bitter toward Constantine, even to the extent of
maligning and slandering him.

5. Constantine' s Activity in Church Affairs, and his Motives

The friendliness of Christian writers toward Constan-
tine is so evident that it needs no proof nor comment Euse-
bius, and his successors, united in extolling Constantine
not only as the first Christian emperor, but as their deliv-
erer and their divinely sent prince. None ventured upon
serious criticism of him, and, in Christian writings, even
the most harmless suggestion of any imperfection in him
was usually veiled by reference to the evil influence of
others.^

We may conclude, then, that imperial patronage as well
as the legislative power of the emperor was exerted in-
creasingly in favor of the Christians, and that the total
effect of his reign was an overwhelming asset to the church.
Acts and tendencies to the contrary were only incidental to
a gradual change in that direction and to the natural sur-
vival of earlier conditions. Such, beyond reasonable doubt
was the retention by him until his death, and indeed by
his immediate successors, of the title Pontifex Maximus,
which designated the emperor as honorary head of the old
official religions.

The spirit or purpose dominant in this use of imperial
power and patronage is not altogether clear, important as
this is for the understanding of the history of the church.
Of two such authoritative historians as Seeck and Ed.
Schwartz, the former exhibits Constantine as dominated

^ Cf. his edition of Gibbon, Decline and fall of the Roman Empire,
ii, appendix i, p. 534, under Praxagoras.
' Cf. Eusebius, Life of Constantine, iv, 29, 31.

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[68

by religious or superstitious motives and by those whom he
looked upon as representatives of the divine power,^ the
latter speaks of the sovereign high-handedness with which
he ruled the church.^ Neither extreme is warranted. There
is no evidence that the first Christian emperor sought to use
the church organization for any political ends or to impose
upon it any task alien to its own conception of its ends.
The evidence that he devoted resources of the state to the
support of the church is abundant; there is none that he
used even the moral resources of the church for the sup-
port of the crown. Statements to the latter effect are
merely inferences, and for the most part based on a priori
reasoning. And yet Constantine was far from putting
himself unreservedly under the control of the church lead-
ers. His attitude towaTd_lhe^whole_sit^^ a
statesman^ not that_jQf-.,a,_fariatix:. Nor did he, appar-

ently loolTupon the church organization as an institution
superior to, and independent of, the imperial power. He
took an active part in its management.^ The chief interest
he displayed on this score was that the ecclesiastical ma-
chinery should run smoothl}^ and that the cult of the su-
preme God, the God who gave victory, should be main-
tained in full efficiency.

Shortly after he was established in control of the West
he took a hand in the troubles in Africa out of w^hich the

^ Seeck throughout represents Constantine as unselfish and not at all
ambitious. He even expounds his military career on the basis that he
tried his utmost to uphold Diocletian's system of governing the em-
pire, that he had no desire to increase his own power or territory, and
that all his wars were defensive. Cf. Untergang d. antiken Welt, i, p.
112, et passim. This preposterous proposition I can explain only as an
extreme reaction against Burckhardt's exposition of Constantine as the
embodiment of unscrupulous ambition, and as an instance of Seeck's
habit of assuming a motive for his characters and then construing
everything in accordance with that motive.

2 Kaiser Constantin und die christliche Kirche, p. 70.

3 Eg. cf. Eusebius, Life of Constantine, i, 46.

69] IMPERIAL PATROXAGE OF CHRISTIANITY 69

Donatist schism developed. He gave his support from
the first to the regular organization/ but submitted matters
in dispute to Miltiades, bishop of Rome, and three of his
colleagues from Gaul.^ In this and in some subsequent
matters Constantine employed the bishop of Rome in the
West as a kind of secretary of state for Christian affairs,^
and contributed not a little to the growing power of the
Roman see. When the vindication which Caecilian, the
regular bishop, received from this Roman tribunal failed
to quiet the African disturbance, the emperor convoked the
famous Synod of Aries (314) which also condemned the
schismatics and took advantage of the occasion to draw
up various rules for church discipline.* As the schism,
instead of subsiding, grew in violence, Constantine tried to
settle it himself by summoning leaders of the two factions
and hearing them in person. Deciding in favor of Caecil-
ian, he sent commissioners to restore peace in Africa,
meanwhile retaining these contestants in Italy. They es-
caped to Carthage, however, and the struggle continued.
For a while Constantine tried forcible expulsion of the
Donatists from churches, but later gave this up and con-
tented himself with stating his disapproval of the schis-
matics and urging the Catholic leaders to have patience.^

' (7/. letters in Eusebiiis, Church History, x, 5, 15-17; x, 6, 1-5; x,
7, 1-2.

^ Ibid., X, 5. 18-20. Fifteen Italian bishops were later joined to these
four.

' The phrase is from George Finlay, History of the Byzantine Empire,
Book I, iii, sec. 3.

* C/. letters of Constantine: Eusebius, op. cit., x, 5, 21-24, and Migne,
Patrologia Latina, vol. viii, p. 487. Cf. also the Sylloge Optatiana, in
the Vienna Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, vol. xxvi,
p. 206. Seeck, dates the council, 316, Zeitsch. f. K. G., x, 509.

^ For a clear discussion of this procedure with references to sources,
cf. Duchesne. Histoire ancienne de I'Eglise, Eng. trans. Early History
of the Church, vol. ii, pp. 92-97.

yo CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [70

Constantine's participation in the next great ecclesiastical
controversy of his reign, the Arian trouble, ran a course
somewhat parallel to the preceding. The conflict was in
full blast at Alexandria when Constantine gained control
of the East. He tried by letters, carried in person by
Hosius to Bishop Alexander and to Arius, to induce them
to restore peace by mutual toleration of differences of opin-
ion.^ This failing, and in view, also, of a widespread dif-
ference in the time of the observance of Easter, Constan-
tine proceeded to summon a great council at Nicea. The
bishop of Rome, so far as we know, did not figure in the
preliminaries of the council. There was no one in the East
holding a central position corresponding to his, so Con-
stantine assumed immediate direction of the affair. At the
first session of the council he made his entrance in state,
and replied in a set speech to the oration of thanksgiving
with which he was addressed.^ He followed the de-
bates and occasionally took part in the discussion. The
decisions of the council both as to the proper date
for observing Easter, to which the emperor himself at-
tached most importance, and as to the doctrinal questions
raised by the Arian controversy were confirmed by im-
perial letters.^ The further course of the controversy also

* Eusebius, Life of Constantine, ii, 63-73 ; giving a copy of the long
letters.

2 For the part taken by Constantine in the proceedings of the council,
cf. Realencyklop'ddie filr prot. Theol. und Kirche, xiv, 12, 30-45.

• Such, substantially, is Eusebius' account. Cf. Life of Constantine,
iii, 6-23 ; also i, 44. This is the most important contemporary descrip-
tion, but tells little about the debates, about the course by which de-
cisions were reached, or even about the decisions themselves. The
literature on the Council of Nicea is extensive, and important points
are still obscure. Duchesne's account, op. cit., vol. ii, pp. 98-124, gives
clearly the generally accepted version, if indeed there may be said to be
such a thing.

71 ] IMPERIAL PATRONAGE OF CHRISTIANITY yi

substantiates Eusebius' comparison of Constantine to a
" general bishop constituted of God." ^ But it is not nec-
essary here to go into the temporary success of the Arian
reaction, the recall of Arius from banishment, and the
first triumph of Athanasius' enemies, resulting in his exile
and imprisonment at Treves. Constantine, while hope-
lessly at sea as to the theological aspects of the contro-
versy, controlled the proceedings and gave preponderance
to those whom he favored, and exile to those whom he
condemned.^

Constantine did not succeed in stifling ecclesiastical con-
troversy by government pressure. But he undoubtedly
contributed to the realization of the purpose for which he
labored, the unity of the church in the support of the cultus
of the Supreme God. His dictum, whatsoever is deter-
mined in the holy assemblies of the bishops is to be regarded
as indicative of the divine will," ^ involved in his mind
the co-operation of state and church in winning and keep-
ing the favor of this Supreme God, the bestower of all suc-
cess. It however involved also the subsequent development
of a state church with intriguing bishops, an iron organi-
zation and thought-confining dogma linked to a military
absolutism.*

^ Op. cit., I, 44.

^ Our chief, but by no means our only, source of information on these
matters is the writings of Athanasius. For a modern account based
largely on these writings, and judiciously favorable to their author, cf.
Duchesne, op. cit., ii, pp. 125-152. For an account almost bitterly hostile
to Athanasius, and extremely distrustful of his statements, cf. Seeck,
Untergang d. antiken Welt, vol. iii, pp. 431, et passim.

' Eusebius, op. cit., iii, 20.

* Cf. Ed. Schwartz, Kaiser Constatitin u. d. christliche Kirche, pp.
169-171.

CHAPTER IV

THE " CONVERSION " OF CONSTANTINE, AND THE RELIGIOUS
REVOLUTION OF HIS TIME

I. Various Early Accounts

CoNSTANTiNE Came into direct contact with the East
as emperor only after his final triumph over Licinius. His
reign henceforth, as we have seen, was not only favorable
to the Christians, but was essentially the reign of a Chris-
tian sovereign. It was in this capacity that the historian
Eusebius, who lived in Palestine, first came to fully know
him. It was very natural, therefore, that Eusebius in his
Church History, which he wrote during and almost imme-
diately after Constantine's rise to power,^ should assume
that Constantine had been a Christian from the beginning
of his career.^ Throughout the work there is no word of
a conversion of Constantine, of any miraculous vision in-
strumental in the process, or of any need of his being con-
verted at all. On the contrary, it tells how, before the
campaign against Maxentius in 312, he "took compassion
upon those who were oppressed at Rome [the Christians
under Maxentius], and having invoked in prayer the God
of heaven, and his Word, and Jesus Christ himself, the
Saviour of all, as his aid, advanced with his whole army,
proposing to restore to the Romans their ancestral lib-

^ For the dates of the various parts of the Church Historj^ cf. the
critical apparatus of the edition of Schwartz and Mommsen.
2 viii, 13, 14; ix, 9, 2; 3; 9-1 1.

72 [72

THE "CONVERSION" OF CONSTANTINE 73

erty." ^ Eusebius' later version of the matter, which he
gives in his Life of Constantine, written some fifteen or
twenty years after the passage quoted above, is quite dif-
ferent. It contains a description of the emperor's sudden
conversion by a miraculous apparition in the heavens inter-
preted the following night in a dream. This episode will
be discussed later ; ^ but the question whether a sudden con-
version of some sort or other took place must be consid-
ered here. Legends from pagan sources, as well as Euse-
bius' Life of Constantine, incorporate the view that the
emperor underwent such an experience. The sources of
information examined in our previous chapters do not point
to such a conclusion, but we may well look into other evi-
dence.

2. C onstantine" s Early Paganism

Constantine apparently identified himself with paganism
during the time he ruled north of the Alps as the suc-
cessor of his father, Constantius. Eusebius' early opinion
to the contrary is discredited not only by his later contra-
diction of it, but by his remoteness from Gaul.^ That he,
following in his father's footsteps, extended toleration to
the Christians is certain; but various pagan emperors had
previously done the same. This is no proof that he himself
entertained Christian views. That his father was a Chris-
tian and conducted his household as such is implied in
Eusebius' Life of Constantine; * but this is, on such a point,
questionable authority, and the particular passages con-

^Ihid., ix, 9, 2. It will be noted that this marks the inception of the
campaign, and that the opening engagements of the war follow it in
paragraph three.

- Cf. infra, p. 135 et seq.

2 The addresses in Lactantius' Div. Inst, implying that Constantine
was a Christian in 311 or earlier, have been shown to be interpolations.
Cf. Brandt's ed. in CSEL. xix, 668.

* i, 16-18; ii, 49; this latter purporting to quote Constantine.

74 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [74

cerned are unquestionably highly overdrawn/ Some slight
evidence in support of Eusebius' eulogy there may be in
the fact that Constantius gave one of his daughters, Con-
stantine's sister, what seems to be a specifically Christian
name, Anastasia (Resurrection), though in any case this
name may have been proposed by a Christian mother.^
Eusebius himself, however, in his Church History, speaks
of Constantius' being ranked by his subjects among
the gods and receiving after death every honor which
one could pay an emperor.^ Lack of substantial evi-
dence for Constantius' being a Christian, leads one
to accept the general opinion that, while probably a
devout monotheist and certainly tolerant toward the Chris-
tians, he was not himself one of them. As for Con-
stantine in Gaul, the only local and strictly contemporary
evidence we possess is found in the panegyrics of Eumenius
and an anonymous orator, generally identified as Nazarius.
Eulogistic orators are not unimpeachable historical sources,
but these two take at least relatively high rank among those
who spoke in honor of Constantine. Eumenius was one of
the foremost scholars of his time, the head of a consider-
able literary circle at Autun, in Gaul,, and enjoying the per-
sonal and financial support of the emperor.* His pane-
gyrics, and the anonymous one referred to above, show de-
tailed familiarity with Constantine's career in Gaul. There
is no reason for questioning their statements about his re-

^ For discussion of the reliability of Eusebius' Life of Constantine,
cf. infra, pp. 107 et seq.

' Cf. on this Se.eck, Untergang d. antik. Welt, i, pp. 61, 473.

^viii, 13, 12. The remoteness of Eusebius from the West would not
invalidate his statements about such official matters to the same extent
as it would his statements about the personal religious convictions of a
Western ruler.

* For a modern account of the school at Autun, cf. G. Block, in La-
visse's Histoire de France, vol. i, part ii (1900).

75]

THE ''CONVERSION" OF CONSTANTINE

ligious affiliations, for paneg>Tists, even though they were
otherwise untrustworthy, could be relied upon not to offend
the convictions of the subject of their praise. What they
have to say about their prince's religion, furthermore, is
told incidentally, as patent fact, not as argument or proof,
but as basis for obviously acceptable praise. Both orators
represent Constantine as a devout pagan of monotheistic
belief.

Eumenius, in a panegyric delivered in 310, in the pres-
ence of his royal patron, refers to a visit of the latter to
the Apollo temple at Autun before a renewed attack upon
the Franks, and proceeds to extol the divine qualities of
the young ruler, and to recite the favor of A_pollo to him.
" For thou sawest, I believe, thine Apollo, accompanied by
Victory, offering thee the laurel crowns." " Now all tem-
ples seem to call thee to themselves, especially our Apollo,
in whose seething waters perjuries, which thou must have
hated most of all, are punished." " Immortal gods, when
will you grant that day on w^hich this god most manifest,
universal peace restored, may go about among those groves
of Apollo himself, and among the sacred abodes, and the
breathing mouths of the springs. . . . Thou wilt assuredly
marvel at that abode of thy very divinity." ^ The orator

^Panegyric 310, chaps. 20, 21, 22; in Pan. Vet., no. vii, and in Migne,
P. L., viii, col. 637 et seq.

" Ipsa hoc si ordinante fortuna, ut te ibi rerum tuarum felicitas admo-
neret, diis immortalibus, ferre quae voveras, ubi deflexisses ad tem-
plum [of Apollo] toto orbe pulcherrimum, imo ad praesentem, ut veniste,
deum. Vidisti enim, credo, Constantine, Appollinem tuum, comitante
victoria, coronas tibi laureas offerentem," etc. "Jam omnia te vocare
ad se templa videantur, praecipueque Apollo noster. cujus ferventibus
aquis perjuria puniuntur, quae te maxime oportet odisse."

" Dii immortales, quando ilium dabitis diem, quo praesentissimus hie
deus omni pace composita, illos quoque Apollinis lucos et sacres sedes et
anhela fontium ora circumeat. . . . Miraberis profecto illam quoque
numinis tui sedem," etc.

76 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [76

closes with a delicately worded, but urgent suggestion that
Constantine repair the public buildings and especially the
temple of Autun. The formal thanks of that city for its
restoration and for the grant of the imperial name, Augus-
todunum, presented to Constantine by Eumenius in the
panegyric of the following year, show that the allusions to
Apollo were not ungrateful.

The whole episode is reinforced by a reference in Julian's
Orations ^ to a special Helios cult of Constantine's, by
Eumenius' emphasis upon his relation to Apollo, and by
the frequency of the tokens of the Sun-god ^ on Constan-
tine's coinage.

The anonymous panegyric of 313, usually attributed to
Nazarius,^ informs us that Constantine invaded Italy to
fight Maxentius against the advice of men, and the warn-
ings of soothsayers ("contra consilia hominum, contra
Haruspicum monita"), showing that he had consulted the
omens. This oration was delivered after the return of
Constantine to Gaul from his victory over Maxentius, and
perhaps the effect of that campaign * upon the religious
ideas of Constantine are reflected in the questioning mono-
theism of the orator in his peroration.'^

1 Oration, vii, p. 228 D (ed. Hertlein).

2 Apollo, Mithras, " Soli Invicti Comiti."

^Incerti Paneg. Constantino Augusto, 313, in Migne, P. L., viii, especi-
ally col. 655, chap. ii. Cf. also, supra, p. 36; infra, p. 132, n. i.
Cf. infra, pp. 77-79.

^ Ibid., chap. 26, Quemobrem te [Jove], summe sator, cujus tot
nomina sunt, quot gentium linguas esse voluisti, quern enim te ipse dici
velis scire non possumus : sive in te quaedam vis mensque divina est,
qua toto infusus omnibus miscearis dementis, et sine ullo extrin-
secus accedente vigoris impulsu per te ipse movearis : sive aliqua supra
omne coelum potestas es, quae hoc opus tuum exaltiore naturae arce
despicias : te, inquam, oramus et quaesumus," etc.

For light upon this whole subject from another angle, cf. infra, pp.
T31-132 et seq.

77]

THE "CONVERSION" OF CONSTANTINE

3. Campaign against Maxentius, and Adoption of Christian

Labarum

In this campaign against Maxentius there took place an
episode which an early Christian legend fixed upon as the
definite conversion of Constantine to Christianity/ Mod-
ern historians have occasionally denied the occurrence of
the episode, and looked upon it as merely the later invention
of the emperor or of his pious biographers. There seems,
however, to be no reason for rejecting the simple and
straight-forward account of the narrator of the earliest ver-
sion of it which has come down to us. Lactantius (Lucius
Caelius Firmianus) was for some years a member of Con-
stantine's household and the tutor of his son Crispus." In
his De Mortibiis Persecutoriim he says that " Constantine
[encamped in the neighborhood of Rome, opposite the
Milvian bridge] was directed in a dream to cause the
heavenly sign to be delineated on the shields of his soldiers,

* A pagan legend dated the conversion much later. On this, cf. infra,
pp. 127 et seq.

' I think we are on safe ground now in accepting Lactantius' author-
ship of the De Mortibus Perseciitorum. Cf. R. Pichon, Lactance
(Paris, 1901), pp. 337-360; Harnack, Die Chronologie der altchristlichen
Litteratur, vol, ii (Leipsic, IQ04), pp. 421 et seq.; O. Bardenhewer,
Patrologie (Freiburg, 1910), p. 181 ; Monceaux, Histoire litteraire de
I' Africa chretienne depuis Ics origines jiisqu'd I'invasion arabe, vol. iii
(Paris, 1905), pp. 340-342, Brandt, one of the greatest authorities upon
Lactantius, attempted to prove what had often been surmised before,
that the book is by an imitator of Lactantius, in " Ueber die Entste-
hungsverhaltnisse der Prosaschriften des Lact. u. des Buches de morti-
bus persecutorum," in Sitzungsberichte der Wiener Akad., vol. cxxv,
Abh. vi (1892), but his case now seems definitely lost. For an excellent,
brief summary of the matter, see Bury, in his edition of Gibbon's De-
cline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1896), vol. ii, pp. 531-533. For
the life of Lactantius, see Brandt, " Ueber das Leben des Lact.," in
Sitzungsberichte der Wiener Akad., vol. cxx (1890).

The De Mortibus Persecutorum, in any case, must have been written
soon after 313.

78 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

and so to proceed to battle. He did as he had been com-
manded, and he marked on their shields the letter X,
with a perpendicular line drawn through it and turned
round thus at the top, being the cipher of Christ,
Having this sign, his troops stood to arms." ^

In this account there is nothing said about a miraculous
vision or about Constantine being converted to Christianity.
All that the author tells is that in a dream the promise of
victory was associated with the use of the monogram of
Christ, and that the event turned out as the dream foretold.
The dream itself is, of course, not susceptible of historical
proof, but Constantine's use of the monogram of Christ's
name, for the first time, during this campaign, and his use
of it thereafter, is supported by abundant evidence.^ ' Its use
in the first instance may have come as well from a dream
as from anything else. That political or military consid-
erations could scarcely have led him to take this step, and
that they could not have played any large part in Constan-
tine's adoption of Christianity, is clearly proved by Seeck.^

^ Chap. 44.

2 Cf. supra, p. 47, infra, pp. 79-81 ; and in addition to Eusebius' reiter-
ated statements, Lactantius, de Mort. Persec, chap. 44; Prudentius, In
Symmachum, ii, lines 464-486. Also many coins and medals. For the
monogram on helmets, see Numismatic Chronicle, 1877, pp. 44 et seq.,
plate i (article by Madden, "Christian Emblems," etc.). A labarum
containing the Christian emblems was probably long after deposited in
the palace at Constantinople, Cod. Theod., vi, 25; Theophanes,
Chronogr., p. 11. For some other evidence, see Schultze, Zeitsch. f.
K. G., xiv (1894), pp. 521 et seq.

^Deutsche Rundschau, April, 1891, pp. 73-84, and repeatedly in his
Untergang d. antiken Welt. The Christians constituted a very small,
almost negligible part of the army and, so far as we know, had as yet
taken no part in politics. Italy was predominantly pagan, and Rome
especially so. There could have been no inherent military or political
advantage in displaying Christian emblems there. Cf. also Fedele Savio,
La Conversione di Costantino Magno e la Chiesa all' inizio del secolo
iv, in La Civilta Cattolica, 1913, vol. i, pp. 385-397.

79] THE "CONVERSION" OF CONSTANTINE 79

That some curious natural phenomena in the heavens may-
have impressed the contestant for Italy and led to the use of
the cross is possible, but hardly meets the requirements of
any of our sources. /Eusebius' detailed account of a
heavenly apparition is followed by a reference to a dream
the following night, and this is to some extent a corrobor-
ation of Lactantius. Where the former goes beyond the
latter, we have merely an instance of legend-making
powers at work/

All that the incident involves, then, was the association
of victory with the use of the wonderful monogram. /^t
was a superstitious age, and Constantine in fact used the
labarum bearing this monogram, and the monogram itself,
as a magical charm, a fetich^ For him and for the Chris-
tians generally, including their bishops, divine power re-
sided in it; its use brought success and good luck. By it
Constantine probably felt that he prevailed over his ene-
mies. What he adopted before the battle of the Milvian
Bridge, was not Christianity but a luck token." The cross
had by this time become generally used by Christians as a
magic sign before which demons fled.^ Constantine used
both the monogram of Christ and the cross. It is often
difficult in reading the accounts of Eusebius and later
waiters to tell to which of the two they refer.

The monogram >£; had not always been an exclusively
Christian sign; it was used on oriental banners in pre-
Christian times, probably as one of the many symbols of

1 Cf. infra, p. 135 et seq.

^Eusebius, Life of Constantine, i, 31; ii, 6-7; ii, 16; Oration in Praise
of Constantine, chap. 6, 21 ; chap. 9; chap. 10. Many of these passages
embody fetichism pure and simple.

3 Lactantius, Diz'ine Institutes, iv, 27; De Mort. Persecut., chap. 10.
For earher accusation that Christians worshiped the cross, see Tertul-
lian. Apology, chap. 16, and Ad Nationes, 1, 13.

8o CONSTANTINE AXD CHRISTIANITY [go

the sun.^ It appears on coins in the late third, in the sec-
ond, and the first centuries before Christ.^ But it is ap-
parent that Constantine's Christian friends regarded it as
an emblem of their religion. We have no evidence that his
pagan contemporaries regarded his use of it as indicating
adherence to the sun-god.^

The cross also was used symbolically by others than the
Christians. It has been, among various peoples, a com-
mon object in nature worship.* Early Christian writers
speak of its recurrence in nature and of its general sym-
bolism apart from their own religion.^ It was in such uni-
versal use among the Christians, howxver, as a religious
token and sign of magic power that by the time of Con-
stantine it must have been regarded almost as their prop-
erty.° It is interesting to note that for Eusebius it was a
symbol of immortality rather than a token of Christ's sacri-
ficial or vicarious death.'

That a great general would expect divine help through
using a symbol, that he would attribute his victory to a

* Cf. Zalin, Constantine d. Grosse u. die Kirche, p. 14.

- Rapp, "Das Labarum u. der Sonnenkultus," in Jahrbiich des Vereins
von Altertiimsfrennden im Rheinlande, 1866, pp. 166 et seq.

3 Bury is a little over-cautious in his statement : " It is not clear that
Constantine used it as an ambiguous symbol, nor yet is there a well-
attested instance of its use as a Christian symbol before A. D. 323 {cf.
Brieger, in Zeitsch. f. K. G., iv (1881), p. 201)."

* It was commented, for instance, that it was one of the emblems in
the Tem.ple of Serapis at Alexandria at the time that temple was de-
stroyed. Sozomen, vii, 15; Socrates, v, 17.

^Justin Martyr, First Apology, chaps. Iv, Ix ; Tertullian, Apology,
xvi; Ad Nationes, i, 13.

^ Cf. references, supra; also Tertullian, De Corona, 3.

Eusebius, Life of Constantine, \, 32, and elsewhere when he men-
tions the cross.

8l] THE "CONVERSION" OF CONSTANTINE gl

divine monogram, is difficult for us to realize to-day, but
as Seeck and others have shown, it was very natural in the
fourth century. It was much more natural than free-
thinking and absence of superstitious considerations. The
clear-minded man who, himself uninfluenced by religious
forces or fears of supernatural power, used these for the
ends of his own ambition, as Constantine is sometimes
assumed to have done, would have been the exception at
that time, if not an impossibility.^ Lactantius apparently
believed that Licinius, who was not of that author's religion,
was taught in a dream by an angel a magic formula in the
shape of a vague monotheistic prayer, which, repeated in
the presence of the enemy, insured victory.^

4. Constantine' s Christianity

Having adopted the magical symbol of the Christian
God, and finding it successful, Constantine pursued this
primitive allegiance to its logical end. He favored the
church which represented this God, and allied himself more
and more with its officers and its teachings. /His conver-
sion was thus a gradual process extending from the war
with Maxentius, or earlier, and ending only with his last
illness. ; Certain episodes mark the stages of this develop-
ment; the victory over Maxentius, the attainment of sole
emperorship by the victory over Licinius,""' and probably
also the Council of Nicea. In the first two cases the decid-
ing factor was the success with which the Christian God

^ Burckhardt, and others, in picturing Constantine as such a man,
came near creating a modern legendary Constantine as the product of
nineteenth-century free-thought. Cf. infra, p. 99.

-De Mort. Pers., 46. Seeck, in his Untergang d. antiken Welt, accepts
Lactantius' account of the battle which followed, in every detail, even
to the successful carrying-out of this plan.

^ Cf. Seeck, Untergang d. antiken Welt, i, pp. 61, 472-3.

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[82

crowned his arms/ In neither was the change so great
as it has usually been considered. To the end of his days
probably his chief conception of Christianity was that of a
cult whose prayers and whose emblems ensured the help of
the supreme heavenly power in military conflicts and politi-
cal crises, and whose rites guaranteed eternal blessedness.
Of the inner experiences of Christianity and of the doc-
trines of that religion, other than the broadest monotheism,
he seems to have had little conception.

The great Arian controversy seemed to him intrinsi-
cally trifling and of little moment " involving " not any of
the leading doctrines or precepts of the Divine law " but
concerning " small and very insignificant questions." ^
Upon the proper day for observing Easter, however, vital
issues depended. " A discordant judgment in a case of
such importance and respecting such a religious festival, is
wrong," " discrepancy of opinion on so sacred a question
is unbecoming." ^ At the court Easter was celebrated with
gorgeous ceremonies, and martyr's days and other sacred
occasions were carefully observed.*

5. The Transition from Paganism to Christianity in the
Roman Empire

In all of this, Constantine did not differ greatly from the
current notions of his day, pagan and Christian. Most
men seem to have been seeking charms to give them success
in this life and happiness hereafter. Belief in one supreme

1 Cf. the prayer which Eusebius said was enforced in the army, Life
of Constantine, iv, 20.

' Eusebius, Life of Constantine, ii, 68-71, reproducing letter to Alex-
ander and Arius.

^ Op. cit., iii, 18 and 19, reproducing letter of Constantine respecting
the Council of Nicea.
^ Op. cit., iv, 22 and 23.

THE '• CONVERSION" OF CONSTANTINE

heavenly power, in the future life, and in the necessity of
expiatory rites, was common to Roman paganism of the
fourth century, modified as it had become by prevalent in-
fluences, and to Christianity.^

Remembering the presence of numerous Orientals in
Gaul ^ and Constantine's connection with the cult of the
sun,^ the transformation of Roman religious life as de-
scribed by Cumont is illustrated and confirmed by the case
of Constantine. " The last formula reached by the religion
of the pagan Semites and in consequence by that of the
Romans, was a divinity unique, almighty, eternal, universal
and inefifable, that revealed itself throughout nature, but
whose most splendid and most energetic manifestation was
the sun. To arrive at the Christian monotheism only one
final tie had to be broken, that is to say, this supreme being,
resident in a distant heaven, had to be removed beyond the
world." '

" The principal divergence [between Christianity and the
later Roman paganism] was that Christianity, by placing

^ For the gradual change in the tone of the panegyrists and others
from polytheism to monotheism, see Pichon, Les derniers £crivains
profanes, Paris, 1906. A beautiful illustration of this is the peroration
of the anonymous panegyric delivered before Constantine in Gaul in
313- Cf. supra, p. 76. It was certainly not a long step for the orator
of this occasion instead of declaring (chap. 2) that Constantine was
under the care of the supreme mind, while other mortals were left to
the lesser gods, to omit the lesser gods entirely in his peroration.
Cf. infra, p. 132 et seq., and supra, p. 76, n. 5.

" Cf. Cumont, Oriental Religions in the Roman Empire, pp. 107 et seq.

3 Eumenius, Panegyric. Cf. supra, pp. 75-76; Julian, Orat., vii, f.
228, and numerous coins inscribed to " Soli Invicti Comiti." See also
Preger, Konstantinos-Helios, in Hermes, xxxvi, 1901, pp. 457 et seq.

* Op. cit., p. 134. Cf. page xxiv. Cf. also p. 288, where Cumont
quotes with approval Loeschke's statement calling Constantine's letters
" ein merkwiirdiges Produkt theologischen Dilletantismus, aufgebaut
auf im wesentlichen pantheistischer Grundlage mit Hilfe weniger christ-
licher Termini und fast noch weniger christlicher Gedanken."

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[84

God in an ideal sphere beyond the confines of this world,
endeavored to rid itself of every attachment to a frequently ^
abject polytheism. ... As the religious history of the em-
pire is studied more closely, the triumph of the church will,
in our opinion, appear more and more as the culmination
of a long evolution of beliefs."

What was true of Constantine was thus in a measure
true of the Empire at large. Christianity and paganism in
the fourth century did not constitute two fixed, unchanging,
irreconcilable enemies. " The upper class were for gener-
ations far more united by the old social and literary tra-
dition than they were divided by religious belief. ... In
truth the line between Christian and pagan was long wav-
ering and uncertain. We find adherents of the opposing
creeds side by side even in the same family at the end of
the fourth century." ^

The later persecutions seem to have been continued more
by governmental policy than by popular desire. There
was even a general reaction among the people against this
policy. Lactantius was able to give as one of the reasons
why God permitted the persecutions the fact that great
numbers are driven from the worship of the false gods by
their hatred of cruelty." ^ The triumph of Christianity
was comparatively peaceful and left paganism in many in-
stances unembittered. " No advocate appeared ; neither
god nor demon, prophet nor divines, could lend his aid to
the detected author of the imposture [of paganism.] For
the souls of men were no longer enveloped in thick dark-
ness, but enlightened by rays of true godliness, they de-
plored the ignorance," etc.^

1 Dill, Roman Society, 2d ed, p. 13. Cf. also E. F. Humphrey, Poli-
tics and Religion in the Days of Augustine (New York, 1912), pp. 26-
39, et passim, for the situation at the end of the fourth and beginning
of the fifth century. Cf. also, infra, p. 96.

^Divine Institutes, v, 24.

3 Eusebius, Oration in Praise of Constantine, viii, 8.

85] THE "CONVERSION" OF CONSTANTINE 85

^The religious revolution under Constantine was not
unique in the history of the empire though it proved to be
the greatest one. Mithraism and a revival of the cult of
Apollo had prevailed in the court of Diocletian. Chris-
tianity came to the front under Constantine, and Neo-
platonism was fostered by Julian. This oscillation was not
due entirely to an even balance of powder between bitter
enemies, but in part, also, to uncertainty and a wavering
border line.

On the pagan side there had long been a movement un-
consciously leading in the direction of Christianity. Pag-
anism " after three centuries of Oriental influence . . .
was no longer like that of ancient Rome, a mere collection
of propitiatory and expiatory rites perfonned by the citi-
zen for the good of the state : it now pretended to offer
to all men a w^orld conception which gave rise to a rule of
conduct and placed the end of existence in the future life.
It was more unlike the worship which Augustus had at-
tempted to restore than the Christianity that fought it.
The two opposed creeds moved in the same intellectual and
moral sphere, and one could actually pass from one to the
other without shock or interruption. . . . The religious
and mystical spirit of the Orient had slowly overcome the
whole social organism and had prepared all nations to
unite in the bosom of a universal church." ^

On the Christian side the sense of irreconcilable con-
flict between the world and the gospel no longer dominated
all church life. Belief in the speedy end of the world and
apocalyptic descriptions of a miraculous millennium, which
had at first offered to many the only hopeful outcome of
this conflict, were gradually relegated to the byways of
ecclesiastical thought. In the third century, the great Alex-

1 Cumont. Oriental Religions, etc., pp. 210-11.

86 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [86

andrian theologians had completed the reconciliation of
the new revelation and the old philosophy in an evolution-
ary interpretation of Christianity.^ Without surrendering
its claim to finality or the necessity of the exclusion of all
other gods and religions from the mind of the believer, the
new faith found many points of contact and support in
the growing monotheism of paganism. Nor were the
Christians, as we have seen, free from the fundamental re-
ligious notions of the fourth-century piety generally; be-
lief in magic, in good and evil spirits, in the constant inter-
ference of the supernatural in human affairs, and in suc-
cess and victory as the ultimate test of the reality and
supremacy of the god whose aid was invoked.^

The center of Constantine's Christian life and that of
many of his contemporaries is to be sought, not in any
theological or moral convictions, but in the identification of
his fortunes, his luck one might say, with the Christian
god. Eusebius, perhaps unwittingly, tells us as much when
he closes his " Oration in Praise of Constantine " with the
tribute of divine revelations to the Emperor: ^

Yourself, it may be, will vouchsafe at a time of leisure to
relate to us the abundant manifestations which your Saviour
has accorded you of his presence, and the oft-repeated visions
of himself which have attended you in the hours of sleep. I
speak not of those secret suggestions which to us are unre-
vealed : but of those principles which he has instilled into your
own mind, and which are fraught with general interest and
benefit to the human race. You will yourself relate in worthy
terms the visible protection which your Divine shield and
guardian has extended in the hour of battle; the ruin of your
open and secret foes; and his ready aid in time of peril. To

1 Cf. the chapters upon the Hellenizing of church theology in Har-
nack, Dogmengeschichte.

2 Cf. infra, pp. 95-96.

3 Chap. 18.

THE "CONVERSION'' OF CONSTANTINE 87

him you will ascribe relief in the midst of perplexity, defence
in solitude, expedients in extremity, foreknowledge of events
yet future.

6. Constantine's Baptism

Only one contemporary source, Eusebius' Life of Con~
stantine, distinctly affirms and describes Constantine's en-
trance into membership in the Christian Church.^ He is,
to be sure, spoken of as " pious " and God-beloved " in
the Church History, but the same terms are applied to
Licinius, whom nobody has ever accused of being a Chris-
tian, and whom Eusebius afterwards likened to some
savage beast of prey, or some crooked and wriggling ser-
pent" ^ In spite of the friendly relations between Con-
stantine and the church organization, in spite of the part he
took in the church council at Nicea and possibly at Aries,
in spite of public proclamations of Christian faith with
which he is accredited, there is no evidence nor contempor-
ary report of Constantine's becoming even a catechumen
until the last few days of his life. For that and his bap-
tism the only account we have is in his Life by Eusebius.

Here we are told that the emperor, convinced that his
end was near,^ sought purification for the sins of his past

Mv, 61-64.

2 Church History, 9, i; Life of Constantine, ii, i.

3 iv, 61-62. The fact that Constantine was not baptized until his last
illness does not indicate that he then for the first time accepted Chris-
tianity. Fear of the penalties inflicted for mortal sin after baptism
was a powerful motive for the postponement of the rite. In many
other cases than Constantine's it was deferred till the approach of
death, and was sometimes even administered upon the sick-bed (clin-
ical baptism). Constantine's leniency toward the Novatianists {cf. Cod.
Theod., xvi, 5, 2), who were very rigorous in their treatment of those
who had " lapsed " after baptism, may possibly be an indication of sym-
pathy for their position in this respect. On this whole subject, cf,
Dolger, Konstantin d. Grosse u. s. Zeit, pp. 429-447.

88 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [gg

career in " the mystical words and salutary waters of bap-
tism ". He prayed " kneeling on the pavement in the
church itself, in which he also now for the first time re-
ceived the imposition of hands with prayer " [the process
of becoming a catechumen]. Meeting the bishops whom
he had summoned at the suburbs of Nicomedia, he ex-
plained that he had deferred baptism hoping to have it ad-
ministered in the river Jordan, but since God decreed
otherwise he requested it " without delay If he were
destined to recover and associate with the people of God,
and unite with them in prayer as a member of the church, he
would prescribe for himself thenceforth such a course of
life as befitted His service.

" After he had thus spoken, the prelates performed the
sacred ceremonies in the usual manner, and having given
him. the necessary instructions, made him a partaker of the
mystic ordinance. Thus was Constantine the first of all
sovereigns who was regenerated and perfected in a church
dedicated to the martyrs of Christ; thus gifted with the
divine seal of baptism, he rejoiced in spirit, was renewed,
and filled with heavenly light."

" At the conclusion of the ceremony he arrayed himself
in shining imperial vestments, brilliant as the light . . .
refusing to clothe himself with the purple any more." This
account in the Life of Constantine alone, a source not
above suspicion, a eulogy rather than a biography, can
hardly by itself establish the baptism of Constantine as an
historical certainty. But it is confirmed by the best writers
of the following generations with some additional facts
implying independent sources.^ There seems therefore no

1 Or " hesitation ".

-Jerome (Chron., A. Abr. 2353) adds that Constantine was baptized by
Eusebius of Nicomedia (" Constantinus extremo vitae suae tempore ab
Eusebio Nicomedensi episcopo baptizatus in Arianum dogma declinat").

89]

THE "CONVERSION" OF CONSTANTINE

reason to doubt the truth of the narrative, and it is accepted
by practically all modern historians.'

7. Ethical Aspects of Constantine s Life.

A survey of Constantine's Christianity would not be
complete unless it took unto account certain ethical as-
pects of his life and reign which have been occasionally
cited as proof that he was never at heart really a Chris-
tian.

Criticism of his character from pagan sources was not
wanting. His vanity was freely commented on. Eutropius,
Constantine's pagan secretary, and later the friend of
Julian, criticized his administration after the adoption of
Christianity. Ammianus Marcellinus complained of his
prodigality towards his friends. ^ Julian criticized him
severely in the Caesars for extravagance, minimized his
achievements, and accused him of luxury and dissolute-
ness. ^ Zosimus wrote bitterly of his waste of public
money, ^ of his favors to undeserving persons, and of the

This may be an inference from the place where the ceremony was per-
formed, but since Eusebius of Nicomedia was not orthodox, one is led
to think Jerome would not have given his name without direct evidence
calling for it. Inasmuch as Jerome, apparently, did not use the story
of Constantine's conversion through a miraculous vision, and other
episodes from Eusebius' Life of Constantine which would naturally
appeal to him, it may be that he did not even know this work. Cf. also
Mommsen, Chronica minora, i, p. 235.

* For a complete and scholarly summary of the overwhelming evi-
dence for the baptism of Constantine, cf. F. J. Dolger, " Die Taufe
Konstantins u. ihre Probleme," mKons.tantin d. Crosse u. s. Zeit (1913),
pp. 381-394-

'x, 6 and 7 (ed. Ruehl, Leipsic, 1887) : " In prime Imperii tempore
optimis principibus, ultimo mediis comparandus, " " Interfecit num-
eros amicos. "

* xvi, 8 : " Proximorum fauces aperuit primus omnium Constantinus."
^ Cf. infra., pp. 124 127 ''Book i.

90 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [go

crushing burden of taxation imposed by him. ^ He
closes his account of Constantine with a register of his
weaknesses, mistakes and crimes. In the Epitome under
the name of Sextus AureHus Victor the first ten years of
Constantine's reign are praised, in the next twelve he is
said to have been a robber, and in the last ten a dotard
on account of his enormous squandering. ^

Some of these criticisms are supported by the evidence
of Christian writers, also, especially the indictment of
extravagance and favoritism,^ which seems to have been
amply warranted by the facts.^

One fixed standard of Christianity, one of its cardinal
requirements, chastity, Constantine apparently frequently
violated. Heathen panegyrists praised him, indeed, for
his chastity and his conduct toward women in his cam-
paigns.^ Julian, however, in his Caesars accused him of
living luxuriously and dissolutely in time of peace.^ If
this be set down as malicious gossip, it is reinforced by
the rather infrequent and perfunctory praise by Christian
writers,^ where, had there been an opportunity, we would
expect extravagant praise and jubilant comparison with

^Book ii, chap. 38, ed. Bekker (Bonn 1837), p. 104.

''Trachala [from the Greek, rpaxalac,^ one of Constantine's epithets]
decern praestantissimus, duodecim sequentibus latro, decern novissimis
ptipillus ob immodicas profusiones," chap. 41.

^Eusebius, Life of Consianime^ i, 43; iv, i; 4; 31; 54 and 55.

*For one of the fullest recent characterizations of Constantine see
Seeck, Geschichie des Untergangs der antike?t Welt., i, pp. 45-75.

^ Incerti auctoris panegyricus Maximiano et Constantino dicius (307),
chap, iv, in Migne, P. L., viii, col. 612; Incerti Panegy^Hcus (313),
chap, vii, in Migne, P. L., viii, col. 660, and chap, xvii, col. 667;
Nazarius panegyricus (321), chap, xxxiv, in Migne, P. L., viii, col.
605.

* Cf. infra, p. 125.

''Eg. Eusebius, Oration in Praise of Constantine, v, 4.

gi] THE ''CONVERSION" OF CONSTANTINE 91

heathen emperors. The fact seems to be that his oldest
son Crispus was the son of a concubine, Minervina/ and
that either Constantius or Constantine II, born within a
few months of each other, was also illegitimate. Seeck
gives somie evidence that he was not free from irregular
relations during most of the time of his marriage with
Fausta, 307-326.^

In another respect also Constantine deviated from the
standards of primitive Christianity and the standard of
the better Christians of his own day. He was exces-
sively fond of display and his vanity was notorious.
Most of his panegyrists, doubtless with assurance of his
approval, mingled their outrageous flattery with praise
of his personal appearance. He w^as the first emperor
to be pictured wearing a diadem. He adorned himself
with gems, bracelets, jewelled collars, robes with em-
broidered gold,3 and even with false hair of different
colors.^

The most telling indictment of Constantine, however,
grows out of the execution of certain persons closely
related to him, such as Licinius, his colleague and
brother-in-law, Crispus his son, and Fausta his wife.^

^Zosimus, ii, 20, 2; Vict. Epit., 41,4; Zonaras, xiii. Eusebius by ig-
noring Crispus entirely in his Life of Constaiitine {Cf. iv, 40 and 49),
though he had written very highly of him in his Church History (x, 9,
4), may have been influenced by the fact that Crispus was illegitimate,
as well as by the fact that he had been executed by his father's orders.

^ Untergang d. antiken Welt,, i, 476; iii, 425; iv, 3, 377.

'Caricatured by Julian in the Caesars, cf. infra, p. 126.

^ Cf. Gibbon, Decli?ie and Fall of the Ro^nan Empire, ed. Bury, ii,
205; Richardson in Nice7ie and Posi-Nice7te Fathers, Second series, vol.
i, Eusebius, p. 427. Eusebius speciously covers the real facts of his
gorgeous descriptions by ascribing a superior mental attitude to the
emperor. Life of Constantine , iii, 10; Oration in Praise of Constan-
tine, 5, 6.

^To complete the list of executions in his family there could be

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[92

The execution of Licinius in 325, a year or two after he
had surrendered upon promise of security, was by pagan
writers and hostile historians called a violation of faith.
By early Christian writers and by friendly historians it
was ascribed to the continual plotting of Licinius which
made his death necessary. ' The execution of Crispus and
Fausta has been attributed by som.e to their adultery, by
some to a false accusation against Crispus by Fausta,
and the subsequent crime of the latter, and by others to
family dissensions and sultanism such as occurred in the
case of Herod the Great. ^

added the earlier death of his father-in-law, Maximianus, of another
brother-in.law, Bassianus, and the later execution of his nephew, son
of Licinius and Constantia (though this son of Licinius was perhaps
illegitimate). Even if all of these executions were justifiable, as some
of them certainly were, it is an appalling list.

^ Cf. Fasti of Hydatius in Mommsen: Chronica minora, i, p. 232;
Eutropius, X, 6, i: Zosimus, ii, 28, 2 and ii, 29: the last two look at it
as a violation of Constantine's oath made when Licinius surrendered;
Eusebius, Life of Consiantine, ii, 18: Ano?i. Vales., v, 29: Socrates,
Church History, i, 4: Zonarus, xiii, all four of whom exonerate Con-
stantine of any violation of faith. Seeck, Unterga^ig der aiiiiken Welt,
vol. i, p. 183, holds that the execution was necessary, and forced on
Constantine by his army.

^For the execution of Crispus and of Fausta, see Seeck, " Die Ver-
wandtenmcrde Constantins des Grossen," Zisch. f. miss. Theol., xxxiii
(i8qo), 63 et seg., and his Untergang der antiken Welt, in chapters
devoted to Constantine. For list of evidences see Seeck, Untergang
der antiken Welt, iii, 424-5, and add to that list Philostorgius, Church
History, epitomized by Photius, Book ii, chapter 4; Ammianus Marcel-
linus, xiv, 6; see also Bury's discussion in his edition of Gibbon: Decline
and Fall of the Roman Empire , ii, 558. Eusebius ignores the whole
matter, but in two lists of the emperor's sons, which he gives after Con-
stantine's death {Life of Consta7itine, iv,40 and 49), he omits Crispus en-
tirely, thus implying his official execution. Monuments and other me-
morials {e. g., C. I. L., ID, 517) have been discovered with Crispus'
name erased, thus strengthening the theory of his disgrace.

It has been maintained by some, even recently, that Fausta was not
executed at all but was living as late as 340, three years after Constan-

93]

THE ''CONVERSION" OF CONSTANTINE

It is, however, hard to see how the obscure question
of the guilt of those executed and of the motives of the
emperor has any bearing on the rehgious question. If
the executions were unjustifiable they w^ould be con-
demned by a pagan as much as by a Christian conscience ;
if they were in the mind of Constantine unavoidable there
was nothing in either his Christianity or his paganism to
prevent them. No one could argue from the execution
of Don Carlos, that Philip II of Spain professed pagan-
ism rather than Christianity. These family crimes,
whether Constantine's or his victims, may show that he
was suspicious or cruel, or difficult to get along with,

tine's death. Gibbon hazarded this as a possibility {Decline and Fall,
elc.,Qd. Bury,ii,pp.2ii-2i2). Ranke ( Weligeschichie, iii, 521 asserts it,
as does Victor Schultze, Zeitsch. f. K. G viii, p. 534, followed by Boyd:
Ecclesiastical Edicts of the 7 heodosian Code (Columbia Univ. Studies,
etc., vol. xxxiv), p. 17. The evidence upon which this view was based
does not compare in amount with the evidence on the other side and is
extremely faulty, the principal pieces being the fact that Julian Orat., i
(p. 10 ed., Hertlein) eulogizes Fausta as he would not have done had
she been executed and guilty of a crime (her guilt is not necessarily
involved in the question) and the existence of the Anonymi Monodia
(ed. Frotscher Afion. G^aeci oratio funebris, Freiberg, i. S., 1855)
formerly supposed to be (and so labeled in one MS.) a funeral oration
on Constantine, the eldest son of Constantine the Great killed in 340.
This explicitly states that the mother of the dead prince survived him;
but it has been clearly proved to be a much later writing and to refer to
some Byzantine emperor late in the Middle Ages. (Seeck, Zeitsch. f.
Wiss. Theol., 1890, p. 64); Wordsworth: '"Constantine the Great and
his Sons": "Constantius i," in Smith and Wace: Diet., 1,(1877), P- 630;
Bury, in op. cit., ii, p. 534. A heretofore neglected bit of evidence lies
in a letter in Eusebius' Life of Constantine, iii. 52, purporting to be
from Constantine, referring to the benefit of information given him by
his "truly pious mother-in-law" (Eutropia, mother of Fausta), evi-
dently after the execution of Fausta. This would seem to tend either
to disprove the execution or to justify it; in view of the other evidence
probably the latter. Seeck: Die Verwandte7imorde Constantins des
Grossen, pp. 6^-77, holds the execution of both Crispus and Fausta to
have been caused by their joint misconduct.

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[94

and hence they may affect our judgment of his character,
and of the kind of Christianity he experienced ; but they
do not prove that he did or did not profess Christianity.

In view of all the foregoing, it will be seen that it is
easy to pronounce harsh judgment on Constantine.
One of the foremost of present-day writers upon the
period says, " The personal morality of the first emperor,
who, though not a Christian, at least died as a baptized
Christian, was not much above that of an oriental
sultan."^ Not to pause over the question whether even
an oriental sultan" may not have a high standard of
personal morality, the implied criticism has much justi-
fication. Yet it must be remembered that Constantine
compared more than favorably with the other emperors
of his century. Moreover, judging from Christian writ-
ings of the time which have been preserved, it may be
doubted whether the ethical element of that religion
was emphasized then as much as it is usually assumed to
have been emphasized. So far as we can judge, Con-
stantine conceived his own service of the Supreme God
to be chiefly by way of promoting his cult and his
church, and to this task he was true.

8. Summary

If our interpretation of the evidence be correct, the
answer to the question of Constantine's religious position
would be about as follows : He was at first a pagan in-
clined toward monotheism, and friendly in his attitude
toward the Christians. In his government he extended
more and more favors and privileges to the Christians,
and before 323 put Christianity on a level with official

''Schwartz, Kaiser Consta^itin u. d. christliche Kircke, p. 70.
''-Eg. cf. the course of the whole Arian controversy as told by Soc-
rates and other continuators of Eusebius. Cf. also, -infra, p. 102.

95] THE "CONVERSION" OF CONSTANTINE

paganism. After 323, when he was sole emperor, he
used his imperial influence very extensively for Christi-
anity and against paganism/ Personally, he allied him-
self to the Church organization, without joining himself
to it, associated intimately with Christian priests, took
part in councils and identified himself in sympathy with
church affairs so far as ceremonies and preservation
of unity were concerned. He professed belief in that re-
ligion as a whole, in the lordship of the Christian God
over the world, in his revelation through Christ, and in
his providence over his people. He believed that his
own remarkable successes were miraculously furthered
by his use of Christian symbols and by his course toward
the church. He was by no means above reproach in
either his private or public life. He probably prepared
for death by a resolution to live a better and more Chris-
tian life if he recovered from his illness, and by entering
the church through a momentary catechumenate and
through baptism.

The importance of Constantine's religious develop-
ment for the light it throws on the history of religion
has generally been obscured by the emphasis put upon
the profitless question, impossible to answer, whether his
real motives were political or sincerely religious. There
are few men of the fourth century, that critical century in
the history of religion in Europe, about whom we have
so much information, reliable and otherwise. I beheve
that the more this information is studied from the point
of view first mentioned, the more it will tend to con-
firm the theory that Christianity did not come down
into the middle ages through the Roman Empire like
a knife cutting through some foreign substance, but
that it entered into the complex of imperial religious

1 Cf. in addition to references given supra, Eusebius, Life of Con-
stantine, ii, 23 ; 27.

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[96

life along with other oriental influences and came out,
the dominant religion of Europe, by way of a very gen-
eral synthesis.' The Christian writers upon whom
church historians have relied as their sources over-
emphasized contrasts and did not realize this synthesis,
unconscious as it largely was. We recognize that pagan
stories about the early Christians were slanders; it is be-
coming generally recognized that many of the early
Catholic stories about the heretics were slanders ; it is
very probable that many of the Christian stories about
the pagans, emphasizing the contrast between the two
religions, were slanders. Stories of the conversion, the
piety and sainthood of Constantine have their reverse
side in sensational denunciations of pagans in such books
as Lactantius' De Mortibus Persecutoru7n, and in many
paragraphs in other writings.^ The contrast between
religions seems to have been overdrawn as much as was
the contrast between the character and deaths of their
several champions.

' There was not a great deal of difference between Constantine con-
sulting the omens at the Temple of Apollo at Autun, and Constantine
seeking miraculous guidance in battle in his tabernacle as described by
Eusebius, cf. supra, p. 76; infra, pp. 134-135. Nor did Aquilinus, the
Christian, who sought cure for his sickness by spending the night at a
Christian temple (Sozomenii, 3) differ greatly from those who slept in
the temple of Esculapius (Eusebius, Life of Constantine, iii, 56). In fact
in some localities the transition from paganism to Christianity seems to
have been facilitated by Christianizing pagan shrines and retaining meth-
ods of healing and divination used by the pagan priests and oracles,
adopting, however, the name of some saint or angel recognized by the
Christians. The church at which Aquilinus was healed had formerly
been a famous miracle-working shrine. Cf. Mary Hamilton, Incuba-
tion, or the Cure of Disease in Pagan Temples and Christian Churches
(1906), pp. 109-118, 138-140 et passim.

^ Cf. for instance, the account of Galerius' death, Lactantius, op. cit.,
chap. 33 ; the death of Maximinus in Eusebiu?, Church History, ix, 10,
14-15; the death of the heretic Arius, in Socrates, Church History,
i, 38. For a discussion of the last mentioned, see Seeck, Untergang d.
antiken Welt, iii, p. 426 et seq., p. 438 et seq.

PART TWO

THE LEGENDARY CONSTANTINE
AND CHRISTIANITY

CHAPTER I

THE LEGEND-MAKERS

I. Significance of Legends about Constantine

The part which Constantine actually played in the re-
ligious revolution of the fourth century is scarcely more
significant than the place taken in that and subsequent times
by legends about him. Even in his own generation, it was
not only the actual emperor, but the emperor as idealized,
that influenced the thoughts of men and the course of
events. Few men at the time tried honestly to discriminate
between the two. After the lapse of sixteen centuries this
discrimination, though the necessity for it is recognized, is
exceedingly difficult. Many of those who discard in largest
measure material from earlier writers as legendary have
unquestionably created from the remainder a Constantine
as legendary as that one described by their predecessors.
Such has Burckhardt's Constantine been shown to be; a
Machiavellian prince who had no conviction but that of his
own destiny, a cold, clear-sighted, free-thinking, ambitious
statesman, rising to supreme power by playing with the
religious faiths of his subjects, — a being who existed only
on the pages of over-skeptical historical critics, and yet a
powerful influence upon the thought of a whole generation.

Even if we should be fortunate enough accurately to dis-
tinguish the real facts from legends, the latter so long domi-
nated the thought of the world that they have become a
99] 99

lOO

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[lOO

part of history/ Their origin and acceptance, also, bring
into clear relief the intellectual life of the ages through
which they have come to us.

2. Lack of the Historical Spirit in the Time of Constantine

The early and luxurious growth of legends about Con-
stantine is explained partly by the relative weakness of the
investigative and historical spirit of the Romans. History
among them never reached the position of an independent
science. In the educational curriculum it formed a sub-
classification under rhetoric.^ Rhetorical schools, not
formal histories, were the chief means of instructing new-
comers to Rome in history.^ It was only natural that his-
torical incidents were generally distorted for rhetorical pur-
poses, and that it became the fashion in imperial times to
incorporate manufactured documents when authentic ones
were not at hand.*

There seems to have been something of an historical re-
vival in the time of Diocletian and Constantine. But this
was in no sense scientific, it was not even spontaneous. The
Scriptores Historiae Aiigiistae, for instance, vv^hile pretend-
ing independence and impartiality, were in part imitators

^ For in illuminating discussion of the part of legends in the history
of the world, cf. Dunning, " Truth in History," Am. Hist. Rev. xxix
(1914), pp. 217-229.

2 Cf. Cicero, de leg. i, 2, 5, and de or. 2, 9, 36.

3 H. Peter: Die Geschichtliche Litteratur iiber die romische Kaiserzeii
his Theodosius I, und ihre Quellen, i, 10, 61-64.

* For illustrations on a wholesale scale, ibid., i, 248. Cf. from an-
other point of view, O. Seeck: "Urkundensfalschung des 4n Jahrhun-
derts," Zeitschr. f. K. G., xxx, (1909, June), p. 181. Cf. also, H. Peter,
Wahrheit und Kunst Geschichtsdtreibung und Plagiat in klassischen
Altertum, Leipzig, 191 1; Reitzenstein, Hellenistische Wundererjdlt-
lunger, 1906.

jOj] THE LEGEND-MAKERS lOI

of Suetonius, in part mere rhetoricians, and in part sub-
sidized flatterers of the reigning monarch.

Diocletian, a soldier and statesman of first rank, was a
crude patron of letters and Constantine followed in his foot-
steps/ The most notable expression of revived interest in
literary and historical matters was the rebirth of Roman
rhetoric. Gaul was one of its greatest seats, and the pane-
gyric was its most characteristic utterance.^ Fifty-three
panegyrics from between 289 and 321 have come down
from Gaul, mostly from Treves.' Nazarius and Eumenius,
two of the leading lights among these rhetoricians, eulo-
gized Constantine in more than one rhetorical flight. Euse-
bius, in the East, went even beyond them in praise of his
royal patron. Peter's criticism of imperial Roman biog-
raphies holds true of much of this panegyrical rhetoric.
*' Amid the confusion of petty, insignificant details, errors,
exaggerations, careless and malignant fabrications, all judg-
ment and ability to distinguish between the possible and
the impossible was lost. People believed, without asking
the question whether it was possible or not, whether it was
true or not." *

Constantine's imperial influence did not improve histor-
ical standards. Not a highly-educated man,^ he was notor-

^ Peter : Gesch. Liti., i, 95-96.

' For school at Autun, and Eumenius, see G. Block in Lavisse: His-
toire de France, vol. i, part ii (1900), pp. 388-398. Translated in part
in Munro & Sellery: Medieval Civilization.

' Peter : Gesch. Litt., i, 46-49, 95.

* i, 150.

5 Julian, Or. 2, 94 a. p. 102 H. ; Aurelius Victor, Caes, 40, 13 ;
Eusebius, Life of Constantine, iii, 13 (where the emperor ad-
dressed the Council of Nicea, an eastern assembly, in Latin, and used
a Greek interpreter) iv, 32; Exc. Val. 2, 2 ("litteris minus in-
structus") ; Anon. Vales, p. 471; Cedrenus, p. 473.

I02 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [102

iously vain.^ Judging by the panegyrics to which he lis-
tened and which he praised and rewarded, he encouraged
the wildest flights of legend-breeding imagination.

Historical writing among the Christians was as unre-
liable as among the pagans of the empire. Forgeries, pres-
ent in religious writings of the heathen, were equally num-
erous in Christian writings. Even the leading bishops
were " ready to prove the truth of their faith by lies." ^

3. Incentives to Legend-Making

Incentives to embellish Constantine's career with touches
of imagination were, from the first, very strong. The im-
perial throne always distorted accounts of the character
and career of one who occupied it by intensifying all the
lights and shadows. In this particular case there were
pagan writers to do injustice to a Christian ruler. But
most of all, there were Christians whose imagination was
quickened by the emergence of their church from persecu-
tion into full religious liberty and even to supremacy in
the state. They beheld the change wrought, moreover,
not through any struggle and victory of their own, but
through the wonderful military achievements of one w^ho,
always fighting against odds, never knew defeat; a con-
queror w^ho raised the church from the dust and honored
her in the imperial court.

Every apprehension of the evils under the pressure of which
all had suffered was now removed; men whose heads had
drooped in sorrow now regarded each other with smiling coun-
tenances, and looks expressive of inward joy. With proces-

1 Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers, Eiisebhis, p. 427; Victor, Epitome,
61, 63, (Antwerp edition 1579) p. 51; Eutropius, 10, 7; Eunapius Vit.
cedes, p. 41, (Amst. 1822).

2 Seeck, Unicrgang d. antiken Welt, iii, 210-212, 431 et seq., with
specific illustrations from Ambrose of Milan and Athanasius.

103] THE LEGEND-MAKERS IO3

sions and hymns of praise they first of all, as they were told,
ascribed the supreme sovereignty to God, as in truth the King
of Kings : and then with continued acclamations rendered
honor to the victorious emperor, and the Caesars, his most dis-
creet and pious sons. The former afflictions were forgotten
and all past impieties forgiven, while with the enjoyment of
present happiness was mingled the expectation of continued
blessings in the future.^

Thus the final victory of Constantine and Christianity
over persecution and Paganism fired the imagination of
those who were to make the history and the legends of the
future. A state dinner at the council of Nicea gave the
church historian an overpowering contrast between the
days of tribulation and of triumph: "detachments of the
body guard and other troops surrounded the entrance of
the palace with drawn swords, and through the midst of
these the men of God proceeded without fear [only a few
years before, most of them had been criminals in the eyes
of the law] into the innermost of the imperial apartments,
in which some were the emperor's owm companions at table,
while others reclined on couches arranged on either side.
One might have thought that a picture of Christ's king-
dom was thus shadowed forth, and a dream rather than a
reality." ^

European civilization turned on the axis of this man's
reign. It is no wonder that he received the tribute of in-
numerable legends. The desire to know and to tell more
than the plain facts about such a great man, the curiosity

* Eusebius : Life of Constantine, ii, 19.
Ibid., iii, 15. It is perhaps worthy of note that this reflection came
to Eusebius at the imperial banquet rather than during the delibera-
tions of the council. He also rather naively remarks that "not one
of the bishops was wanting at the imperial banquet."

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [104

which in other circles bred a host of legends about Alex-
ander the Great, and Charlemagne, created legends about
Constantine. They began in the emperor's lifetime and
as the worldly greatness increased to which Constan-
tine opened the door for the church, these legends also de-
veloped. Through his triumphal arch at Rome there
marched, no longer Roman soldiers but Christian priests
whose fervor pictured the victor in strangely distorted per-
spective.

For them a great religious revolution had been wrought,
and the more wonderful they made it, the more it accorded
with their inner feelings. This gave a peculiar impetus to
the legend-making process. For the emotional stress con-
nected with religious movements seems more fruitful of
legends than any other, more even than the emotion of pa-
triotic and family pride. Think, for instance, of the swarm
of legends which developed about early Buddhism, Chris-
tianity, and Mohammedanism. Almost every religious
change, such as the introduction of a new religion, gives
rise to a penumbra of this sort. The explanation is un-
doubtedly to be found not only in the general credulity of
the ages in which such changes take place, if indeed this
can be proved, but also in the character of the emotional
and mental activity attending religious agitation and de-
votion. Religion, finding its explanation of human life
and fortunes in the will of God or gods, encourages the
embellishment of events with providential wonders. In
this realm the mysterious and the inexplicable becomes ac-
cepted as self-evident fact.^

Many religions emphasize truth. But this must usually
be understood as meaning, not historical or scientific truth,
as these terms are used to-day, but as another term for the

^ Cf. H. Delehaye, The Legends of the Saints. London, 1907.

1 05] THE LEGEND-MAKERS 105

content of the teaching of these several religions. In
Christian documents, for instance, the word " truth " is
used not so much in the former as in the latter sense ; it is
often synonymous with the revealed content of Christian
teaching, with the gospel

At times one is tempted to think that the love of truth,
which is the basis of all genuine historical criticism, and
of all other scientific work as well, is a comparatively mod-
em product. It almost seems as if it were a new faculty
acquired in the slow^ evolution of the human mind. If this
be too strong a statement, born of impatience at the occa-
sional audacity and success of legend-makers, a study of
the Constantinian legends shows that many former gen-
erations, when plain historical facts lay ready at hand, pre-
ferred to create and accept fanciful stories.

It is perhaps invidious to designate individual writers
in this connection, for most legends are the product of
many minds, the work of whole generations rather than of
isolated persons. Those who bore a conspicuous part in
the making of the legends about Constantine will be dis-
cussed later in connection with these legends. Two men,
however, are so pre-eminently conspicuous in the process
that they require mention here, namely, Constantine him-
self, and Eusebius, his first biographer.

4. Constantine' s Part in the Process

The legend of Constantine's descent from Claudius ^
and of his hereditary right to the imperial purple was so
obviously to his own advantage that it is only reasonable to

1 Cf. articles on a7.r]dsLa in Moulton & Geddes, Concordance to the
Greek New Testament', Thayer, Greek-English Lexicon of the New
Testament; Cremer, Bihlico-Theological Lexicon of New Testament
Greek.

^ Cf. infra, pp. 11 2- 115.

Io6 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [io6

assume that it was promulgated at his instance. Legends
of miraculous manifestations and of his extraordinary piety-
may also, with considerable probability, be laid at his door.
Eusebius repeatedly ascribed extraordinary statements of
that nature to the emperor. Though his assurances to the
reader that he merely repeated imperial utterances are not
altogether convincing, one can not but suspect Constan-
tine of being aware how greatly the good bishop was awed
in his ruler's presence, and how easy and pleasant it would
be to create an exaggerated idea of his own Christian de-
votion.^ The most famous instance of this is the story of
the miraculous conversion of Constantine, which Eusebius
assures us the emperor told him and confirmed with an
oath.^ I am inclined to believe that Eusebius' account of
this conversion was not wholly his own invention, for his
own earlier version of the facts, which he had already
given out in the Church History, was quite inconsistent
with the story of the miraculous conversion.

Stories of the miraculous protection of the special guard
who surrounded and defended the divine standard in battle,
with which Eusebius says the emperor regaled him,^ may
well record the emperor's superstitious attitude toward
this wonderful charm, but they bear the marks, also, of
exaggeration common to the tales which men of war often
tell to men of peace.

For he said that once, during the very heat of an engagement,
a sudden tumult and panic attacked his army, which threw
the soldier who then bore the standard into an agony of fear,
so that he handed it over to another, in order to secure his own
escape from the battle. As soon, however, as his comrade had

Life of Constantine, iii, 60; 61; 62; iv, 33-36.
^ Ibid., i, 28-29. Cf. supra, pp. 77-79, and infra, pp. 136-140.
' Eusebius : Life of Constantine, ii, 7-9.

loy] THE LEGEND-MAKERS I07

received it, and he had withdrawn and resigned all charge of
the standard, he was struck in the belly by a dart, which took
his life. Thus he paid the penalty of his cowardice and un-
faithfulness, and lay dead on the spot; but the other, who had
taken his place as the bearer of the salutary standard, found
it to be the safeguard of his life. For though he was assailed
by a continual shower of darts, the bearer remained unhurt,
the staff of the standard receiving every weapon. It was in-
deed a truly marvellous circumstance, that the enemies' darts
all fell within and remained in the slender circumference of
this spear, and thus saved the standard-bearer from death; so
that none of those engaged in this service ever received a
wound. This story is none of mine, but for this, too, I am in-
debted to the emperor's own authority, who related it in my
hearing along with other matters.

That Constantine was not averse to receiving credit for
religious virtues even on contradictory counts is shown, if
we can accept Eusebius' rendering of his conversation and
his speeches, by his advancing in one place a claim to life-
long possession of Christian piety, and in another place
describing his radical and sudden conversion to that re-
ligion.^

5. Eusebiits of Caesar ea

But making all allowance for the assistance of the em-
peror, Eusebius himself in his Oration in Praise of Con^
sfantine and his Life of Constantine was the chief creator
of the legend of a saintly emperor. Of the former of
these, the author himself said in the latter,^ " we have
woven, as it were, garlands of words, wherewith we en-
circled his sacred head in his own palace on his thirtieth

* Eusebius, Oration of Constantine to the Assembly of the Saints
(the Easter Sermon), chap. 26; Life of Constantine, ii, 49 and 51;
i, 27. Compare these with Life of Constantine, i, 28-32.

2 Chapter i.

Io8 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [io8

anniversary.'' The first part ^ is a eulogy of Constantine's
devoutness and religious leadership, and of the magical
efficacy of the " salutary sign " by which he conquered,
mingled with analogies of Christianity in the natural
world. The last part, often considered a separate oration,
is a general exposition of the true doctrine of God and of
the incarnation of the Word. The first part alone concerns
us. It is a panegyric which from the point of view of his-
torical trustworthiness is not superior to the low level of
the time to which it belongs. Extravagant in its praises
almost to the point of blasphemy,^ its statements are often
gross exaggerations,^ and above all it violently twists all
of Constantine's motives into the most unselfish prompt-
ings of saintliness.* Eusebius shows in Constantine noth-
ing but a superstitious holy-man who turned his own cham-
bers into an oratory, and his household into a church, and
who had oft repeated visions of the Saviour.^

The viciousness of this one-sided eulogy is modified by
the fact that Eusebius himself gives notice in the prologue
that he proposes not a narrative of ''merely human merits"
or " merely human accomplisments " but " those virtues of
the emperor which heaven itself approves, and his pious
actions." He wants to " close the doors against every pro-
fane ear, and unfold, as it were, the secret mysteries of our
emperor's character to the initiated alone." He thus frankly

^ Chapters i-x.

^ Eg. i, 3 and ix, i8, compared with Constantine's domestic tragedies.
Eg. I, 3; 8, 9; 9, 10 compared with actual law on Sunday Cod,
Theod. ii, 8, i and Cod. Just, iii, 12, 3.

* iii, 5 and 6 attribute Constantine's overthrow of Diocletian's sys-
tem and his attainment of sole rulership to an imitation of God's sole
and undivided government of the universe, i, 6; and v, 5-7 attribute
his gorgeous apparel to popular demand which he himself despised.

•^ix. 11: 18.

109] THE LEGEND-MAKERS IO9

avows his intention of painting upon the background of
Constantine's career, the traits of an ideal Christian em-
peror for the edification of a Christian assembly. It may
contain historical truth, but that is not its main purpose.
It intentionally ushers us into the realm of legend.

The same is true of the Life of Constantine written
shortly after the emperor's death,^ and in places built upon
material from the Oration.^ There is more historical ma-
terial in the later work but its tone is the same as that of the
earlier. Eusebius not only extols Constantine as the di-
vinely-appointed emperor to whose elevation no man con-
tributed/ but attributes to him repeated, direct, and mir-
aculous revelations of God, who " frequently vouchsafed
to him manifestations of himself, the divine presence, ac-
cording to him manifold intimations of future events." *
It is a serious question how much reliance to place even in
the speeches, laws and letters of Constantine embodied in
the Life, occasionally with professions that they are copied
from documents in Constantine's own handwriting or with
his signature.^ This ostensibly original material was sav-
agely attacked along with the general reliability of the Life,
by Crivellucci, in 1888,*^ and by H. Peter in 1897,^ the

M, 2.

2(7/. ix, 8; viii; ix, 15; ix, 17 of the Oration with Book ii.
16; iii, 54, 55; iii, 50 and iii, 41 of the Life respectively. The notes
in the English translation in the Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers,
Eusebius, pp. 591 and 593 make the strange mistake of assuming that
the Oration uses the Life, though the former was written first and is
mentioned in the latter.

3 i, 24 4 47, 5 ii^ 47; 23.

^ Storia della relatione tra lo state e la chiesa, vol. i, appendix,
" Della fede storia di Eusebio nella vita di Costantino." He calls it a
historical novel.

' Die geschichtliche Litteratur iiber die romische Kaiserseit bis
Theodosius I und ihre Quellen. He calls it "methodical falsification
of history," i, 249-250, 405 et seq.

no CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [no

worthlessness of these documents was assumed by
Mommsen and by Seeck. Benjamin in Pauly-Wissowa,
Real Encyclopddie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft,
wrote summarily, " The original documents [of the Life
of Constantine] are almost all forged or highly question-
able." ^ Gorres calls it inferior to the panegyrics of Eu-
menius and Nazarius, and Manso says it is more shame-
less and lying " than they. Seeck, however, completely
changed his view by 1898,^ and in the later edition of his
U liter gang der antiken Welt used all of the original docu-
ments in the Life of Constantine as genuine in accordance
with his declaration " Eusebius' reproduction of original
documents has been freed from every suspicion." *
Schultze in his " Quellenuntersuchungen zur Vita Constan-
tini des Eusebius," * occupies commendable middle ground
in submitting each of the questioned documents to thor-
ough scrutiny with the result that some, e. g., the Edict
to the Provincials of Palestine,^ are rejected as forgeries *
and some are accepted as genuine.'^ The list of questioned
documents is a long one,^ but the case against many of
them seems weak.^ There are, however, statements in
others which show that they either are forgeries or con-

* See Article, Constantin.

2 " Die Urkunden der Vita Constantini,'* in Zeitsch. f. K. G., xviii, pp.
321-340.

^Zeitsch. f. K. G., xxx (1909), p. 183.

4 In Zeitsch. f. K. G., xiv (1894), p. 503 et seq.

5 Life of Constantine ii, 24-42.

* In this particular case by a later hand than that of Eusebius.

Eg. compare Life of Constantine iv, 26 and Cod. Theod. viii, 16, i.
8ii, 23-42: ii, 46: ii, 48-60: ii, 64-72: iii, 17-20: iii, 30-32: iii, 52-53:

iii, 60: iii, 61: iii, 62: iii, 64-65: iv, 9-13: iv, 20: iv, 35: iv, 36:

iv, 42 : Appendix : Oration to the Saints.

* There is no reason, for instance, for rejecting the letter of Con-
stantine to the churches after the Council of Nicea, iii, 17-20.

Ill]

THE LEGEND-MAKERS

III

tain interpolations.^ The work, moreover, contains rather
more than Eusebius' usual proportion of minor inaccur-
acies.^ His Church History must of course be judged in-
dependently of his eulogies. It was, for the time, a mag-
nificent historical work. The panegyrists of the fourth
century, however, and Eusebius is no exception, did not
hold themselves up to even the relatively low standard of
truthfulness that prevailed in their day for historical writ-
ings. They offer a curious parallel to the writers of the
Italian renaissance, who were not without merit as his-
torians but whose literary invectives against each other
were pure works of art, not to be believed under oath. The
Life of Consfantine has been well called an evidence of
Eusebius' " enthusiastic admiration for what he consid-
ered the good actions of the deceased emperor, and of his
skill in disguising the others. No trace is found there of
the murder of Crispus and that of Fausta; the author has
discovered a way of telling the story of the Councils of
Nicea and of Tyre, and the ecclesiastical events connected
with them, without even mentioning the names of Athana-
sius and of Arius. It is a triumph of reticence, and of cir-
cumlocution." ^

^ Eg. iv, 9-13, letter to the king of Persia, under the (later) head
ing of Sapor, confuses Sapor II the grandson of Narses and the
contemporary of Constantine with Sapor I, the predecessor of Narses.
Cf. also ii, 51 where Constantine says he was a boy, koul^ iraig^'' at
the outbreak of the Diocletian persecution. Cf. also supra, pp. 53 et seq.

2 Cf. ii, 3 with i, 50, and both with the Church History, x, 8 and Mc-
Giffert's note on this last passage in the N. & P. N. F. translation, iv, 53
purporting to be exact, overstates Constantine's reign by about a year,
iv, 5 and 6 probably has "Scythians" for "Goths"; no such war
against the Scythians is known, iv, 2 and 3 contradicts the well
known financial pressure of Constantine's reign, iii, 21 and 66 en-
tirely misstate the theological situation by representing that peace
reigned after the Council of Nicea.

' Duchesne, Early History of the Church (Eng. trans.), vol. ii, p. 152.

CHAPTER II

LEGENDS OF CONSTANTINE's ORIGIN AND RISE TO IMPERIAL
POSITION, LEGENDS ABOUT HELENA

I. Legend of Claudian Descent

The parentage of Constantine and the beginning of his
rule in Gaul and Britain are the subject of such abundant
evidence that there can be little question as to the main
historical facts.^ He was born at Naissus in Dacia, about
274 A. D. (Seeck puts the date as late as 288 A. D.^), the
son of Constantius (later Caesar in Gaul and Britain)
and of his concubine, or morganatic wife, Helena, prob-
ably a chambermaid before her connection with Con-
stantius. He spent part, at least, of his early manhood
in the East at the court of Diocletian. Hence he was
summoned by his father, and joined him at Bononia
(Boulogne) in time to accompany him on his last ex-
pedition into northern Britain. Constantius apparently
designated him as his successor, and at the death of the
father, the soldiers acclaimed the son Emperor (306).
Constantine contented himself for a time with the title of

Caesar which was recognized and confirmed by Galer-
ius. His administration of Gaul and Britain was entirely
successful, and in 308 he secured recognition as an Em-
peror. By his victory over Maxentius in 312 he became
sole Emperor in the West.

The first legendary variation from these plain historical
facts was the assertion that Constantine was descended

1 Cf. article " Constantin " in Pauly-Wissowa, Real Encyclop'ddie der
classischen Altertumswissenschaft.
' Untergang d. antiken Welt, vol. i, pp. 47, 435.

112 [112

113] CONSTANTIXE'S ORIGIN AND RISE 113

from the Emperor Claudius, one of the unimportant con-
testants of the throne who reigned in Gaul (268-270).
This assertion was first made by the rhetorician Eumenius
in a panegyric delivered in 310 in Constantine's presence.
The orator says that most men were ignorant of the fact,
but that the emperor's intimate friends knew it. He extols
Claudius as the first to restore the lost and ruined disci-
pline of the Roman government, — praise uncalled-for by
any of the known facts of that ruler's career. Such is the
greatness of Constantine's two-fold imperial ancestry, his
eulogist maintains, that possession of imperial rank adds
nothing to his honor. He reiterates this thought : Con-
stantine was not made ruler by any accidental, human pur-
pose, nor by any favorable circumstances, he deserved the
empire by his birth. The imperial palace was his birth-
r'ght.^ This high-sounding rhetoric bears every evidence
of being inspired, not by the facts of the case, but by the
suggestion of the ruler in whose praise, and at whose in-

1 Eumtnius, Panegyriciis, in Pan. Vet. no. vii, (310 A. D.) Migne; P. L.
viii, col. 624 et seq., chap, ii, et seq. A primo igitur incipiam originis
tuae numine quod plerique adhuc fortasse nesciunt, sed qui te amant
plurimum sciunt. Ab illo enim Divo Claudio manet in te avita cognatio.
qui Romani imperii solutam et perditam disciplinam primus reformavit
.... Quamvis igitur ille fecissimus dies proxima religione celebratus
imperii tui natalis habeatur, quoniam te ipso habitu primus ornavit :
jam tamen ab illo generis auctore in te imperii fortuna descendit.
Quin imo patrem tuum ipsum vetus ilia imperatoriae domus praeroga-
tiva provexit; ut jam summo gradu, et supra humanarum rerum fata
consisteres, post duos familiae tuae principes tertius imperator. Inter
omnes, inquam, participes majestatis tuae hoc habes, Constantine,
praecipium, quod imperator es, tantaque est nobilitas originis tuae,
ut nihil tibi addiderit honoris imperium, nec possit fortuna numini tuo
imputare quod tuum est, omissis ambitu et suffragatione.

Chap. iii. " Non fortuita hominum consensio non repentinus ali-
quis favoris eventus te principem fecit. Imperium nascendo meruisti."

Chap. iv. "Sacrum istud palatium non candidatus imperii; sed
designatus intrasti, confestimque te illi paterni lares successorem
videre legitimum. Neque enim erat dubium, quin ei comperet haer-
editas quem primum imperatori filium fata tribuissent."

114 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [114

stance it was uttered. The story of Constantine's Claudian
descent was evidently a surprise to the public, it could only
be launched as something known all the time to favored
friends. The implication must necessarily have been that
his father, Constantius, was an illegitimate son of Claud-
ius, as there is no recognized genealogical connection.

It is significant that the panegyric in which the pronun-
ciamento was made was delivered shortly after the execu-
tion or enforced suicide of Constantine's father-in-law,
Maximian, the only emperor of the original Diocletian sys-
tem from whom he could satisfactorily derive his author-
ity. It is taken by Dessau, Seeck and others as being the
proclamation under Constantine's direction, of a new prin-
ciple of legitimacy, based on a fictitious genealogy.^ The
substitution of hereditary right to the throne for the Dio-
cletian system of appointment and promotion was tempor-
arily carried through successfully by Constantine's military
genius, by the continued succession of his own family to the
throne, and by the adulation of his admirers. Eusebius
went the length of writing that Constantius " bequeathed
the empire, according to the law of nature to his eldest
son," and that Constantine, by bestowing his sister, Con-
stantia, upon Licinius in marriage, granted him the privi-
lege of family relationship and a share in his own ancient
imperial descent." The Emperor Julian, Constantine's
nephew, accepted the Claudian descent of the family.^
Eutropius represented Constantine as the grandson of
Claudius.^ Several writers described him as the nephew ^

^ C/. Dessau, in Hermes, xxiv, p. 341 et seq.; Seeck, Untergang d.
antiken Welt, i, pp. iio-iii, 451, 487-488 (with citations of sources);
Pauly-Wissowa, article " Constantin

^ Life of Constantine, i, 21; i, 50; cf. Church History, x, 8, 4.

s Orat., i, p. 6 D; ii, p. 51 C; Caesars, p. 313 D (ed. Hertlein).

* ix, 22. ^Anon. Vales., i, i.

II-] CONSTANTINE'S ORIGIN AND RISE j j 5

or grandnephew ^ of Claudius. But in one form or another
the relationship was established, and became embodied in
the general belief.

The idea of hereditary succession to imperial power was,
of course, not original, nor in any sense unique, with Con-
stantine. It was, however, important in this connection as
the repudiation of the Diocletian system. Under that sys-
tem the imperial power was divided between emperors
with whom were associated Caesars, chosen for their merits
with a view to the transfer of the higher office to them
through the voluntary abdication of the older men. The
great scheme of Diocletian was doomed to speedy ruin
through personal ambition or necessity, and through family
pride. Imperial power continued to be the prize in whose
pursuit the declining military resources of the empire were
squandered. Hereditary succession to the throne, however,
was Constantine's theoretical substitute for the Diocletian
system, and it seems to have held a larger place in the fol-
lowing generation than it had in the century before Dio-
cletian. For this, Constantine's personal success, and the
disposition of the empire at his death were chiefly respon-
sible. But the invention of a fictitious ancestry, and the
legend in which it was incorporated must also be given due
place as one of the landmarks in the development of the
idea of an hereditary kingship. While the significance of
the whole episode is largely Roman and local, it neverthe-
less aft'ords an interesting instance of the way in which
some of the very foundations of society have been but-
tressed not so much by fact as by legend.^

^ Hist. Aug., Claudius, 13, §2.

2 Seeck maintains that Constantine consistently tried, even to his own
detriment, to uphold the Diocletian system {Untergang d. antiken Welt,
i, pp. 70-71, 112, 176, 186 et passim). This is one of the most curious
of the conclusions to which he is led by fixing on a motive which he

Il6 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [ii6

2. Legends of, Helena and the True Cross

If legends about Constantine's paternal ancestry were
artfully circulated with political motives, legends about
his mother, Helena, were the spontaneous product of pious
imagination. Her pronounced Christian piety not only led
her to devote much of her energy and wealth to the church
and to make a famous pilgrimage to the Holy Land,^ but
made her the heroine of many later traditions. Her pil-
grimage especially, made her the heroine of many versions
of the story of the finding of the true cross, one of the most
famous of all Christian legends.^

The oldest document describing the finding of the cross
on which Christ was crucified is generally thought to be
that embodied, from an independent narrative, in the Doc-
trine of Addai, which book relates the conversion of Abgar,
king of Edessa, by Addai or Thaddeus.^

Here Protonice, wife of Emperor Claudius, is converted
by Simon (Peter) at Rome, and makes a pilgrimage to
Jerusalem with her two sons and her daughter. She is re-
ceived with honor by the Apostle James, and compels the
Jews to turn over to him Golgotha, which they had jeal-
ously guarded. She herself entered the grave there, where

conceives to be dominant and following it to the ends of the earth.
At every turn Constantine upset the Diocletian system, and instead of
fitting the dynastic idea into it only by necessity, the latter was ad-
vanced from the very first. If he bore long with Licinius it may well
have been that he had to do so, or deemed it advisable on other
grounds than devotion to the Diocletian system. If it is agreed that
there was no good material available for another joint emperor, it can
hardly be proved that his sons were any better.

1 Eusebius, Life of Constantine, iii, 42-43.

2 Cf. Acta Sanctorum, under May 4, I, 445.

3 Edited with Syriac text, Eng. trans, and notes by G. Phillips (1876),
pp. 10-16. Cf. also Duchesne: Liber PontiUcalis, i, p. cviii et seq.;
O. Bardenhewer, Patrologie (Freiburg-i- B), Eng. trans., Patrology,
{St. Louis, 1908), p. no.

CONSTANTINE'S ORIGIN AND RISE

11/

the cross of Christ was distinguished from the crosses of
the two thieves by the providential, instantaneous death of
her daughter, and her resurrection when the true cross was
placed upon her. Protonice gave the cross to James. She
then built a great and splendid building over Golgotha on
which he was crucified, and over the grave in which he
was placed, so that these places might be honored." When
she and her children returned to Rom.e, " Claudius com-
manded that all the Jews should go forth from the country
of Italy ".^ This legend of the finding of the true cross
represents the eastern version. In the west it was overshad-
owed by a very different account.

Several different varieties of the western version of the
story of the finding of the cross have come down to us.
These ascribe the leading part in the recovery of the cross
to Helena, the mother of Constantine. This group, whether
derived from the legend given above, the Eastern one, or
itself the original version of it, is in fact the dominant one
in the Middle Ages.^

* Syriac scholars and church historians concur in dating the forged
correspondence of Abgar and Christ in the late second or early third
century. Eusebius refers to it as among accounts of ancient times
(Church History I, 13) and the Abgar legend must have been widely
accepted in his time. This, however, does not prove an early date
for all the stories imbedded in the Doctrine of Addai. Though the
tendency to-day is to maintain the priority of many Syrian accounts
as against Latin and Greek stories about the same things, it seems to
me that in some instances this is erroneous. I do not feel at all
certain that the story of Protonice and the true cross may not be a
later, modified version of that of Helena and the true cross. This
doubt is strengthened by the fact that a church was almost certainly
built over the supposed sepulchre of Christ in the time of Constantine,
and there is no special reason for thinking one had been built there
before that.

' For versions of this lengend, cf. A. Holder, Inventio sanctae crucis^
Leipsic, 1889; Mombritius, Sanctuarium sive Vitae sanctorum (Paris,
1910 ed.), p. 376 et seq.; Acta Sanctorum, under May i, ed. Papebroch.

Il8 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [ng

In one account, probably the older variety, Helena has
no particular difficulty in finding the three crosses, and the
right one is ascertained by a miracle of healing in a test sug-
gested in most versions by Macarius, Bishop of Jerusalem.^

In another form, after many difficulties, the crosses are
brought to light by Judas Cyriac under orders and direc-
tion of Helena. Both forms exist in Syriac, Greek and
Latin. The original Helena legend, as well as that of Pro-
tonice, is generally believed to have been of Syrian origin.
The former, if we can judge from its literary associations,
is closely connected with the legends of Sylvester both in
its origin and in its later development. It is found in many
manuscripts with the Vita Syhestri.^

In one form or another the legend of the finding of the
true cross by Helena became widely current throughout
Christendom. Generally it displaced accounts in which the
honor was assigned to other persons. Occasionally two
accounts (e. g., the Protonice legend and that of Helena)
were combined, and harmonized by having the cross lost
after its first recovery.^ Authoritative writers in the West

^ Cf. Sozomen, ii, i ; Socrates, i, 17, who tells of the recovery also
of the inscription placed by command of Pilate over the head of
Christ; Theodoret i, 18.

2 Cf. infra, pp. 159, 164. Cf. E. Nestle in Bysantinische Zeitschrift,
iv, pp. 319-345. For the whole subject of Helena and the cross, see
references in Bury's ed. of Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Em-
pire, ii, p. 568; Duchesne, op. cit., \, p. cvii et seq.; Richardson, in
op. cit., pp. 444-445 ; Smith and Wace, Diet, of Christian Biography,
art. " Helena". An old, monumental work is that of Gretser, De cruce
Christi, 1600, vol. ii, in Opera, Ratisbone (Regensburg), 1734, which,
however, is entirely uncritical. More recently Nestle, De sancta cruce,
1889; J. Straubinger, Die KreuzaiifUndungslegende, Untersuchungen
iiber ihre altchristlichen Fassungen mit hesonderer Beriicksichtigung
der syrischen Texte. (Forschungen zur christlichen Litteratur und
Dogmengeschichte, vol. xiii, part iii), Paderborn, 1913.

3 Duchesne cites a Syriac version, MS. British Museum 12174.

119]

CONSTANTINE'S ORIGIN AND RISE

119

and East from the end of the fourth century assume at least
the recovery of the true cross to be a fact/

In all the medieval texts vv^hich give in full the legend
ascribing the discovery of the cross to Helena, statement is
made that Constantine was instructed in Christianity by
Eusebius, Bishop of Rome, and most of them add that he
was also baptized by the same bishop. This statement,
however, is not present in the earlier references to the find-
ing of the true cross. ^ The legend of the finding of the
cross is briefly incorporated in the Liber Pontificalis under
the life of Pope Eusebius, though the implication that the
imperial family was Christian at that time contradicts the
statements given later that Constantine was baptized by
Sylvester, the second bishop of Rome after Eusebius."

Of the disposition made of the cross in the various
legends it is enough to say that it was generally either left
in Jerusalem, or taken to Rome, or divided. Part was even-
tually supposed to have been taken to Constantinople. One
of the earliest episodes mentioned in connection with the
cross was the statement that Constantine had the nails of
the cross put in his diadem or helmet and in the bridle of his
horse.* This latter was cited as fulfilling the prophecy of
Zachariah xiv. 20: " On the bridles, Holiness to the Lord."

The most decisive argument against the whole story of
Helena and the cross is the absence of any reference to it

^ Ambrose, Sermo in obit. Theodosii c. 46 (Migne. P. L. vol. xvi, col.
1399); Rufinus, Church History i, 7, 8; Paul'nus ep. 31; Cassiodorus,
Historia tripartita, ch. ix; Socrates i, 17; Sozomen ii, i ; Theodoret i, 18.

2 Cf. infra, pp. 152-153 for Ambrose and Rufinus.

* Ed. Duchesne, i, 167, no. xxxii. " Eusebius natione Graecus, ex
medico, redit ann. vi m. i. d. iii. Fuit autem temporibus Constanti.
Sub hujus temporibus inventa est crux domini nostri Jesu Christi v
non. mai, et baptizatus est Judas qui et Cyriacus."

' Ambrose op. cit., 47, Theodoret and Sozomen, loc. cit. Seeck gives
the incident as genuine.

120 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [120

in Eusebius, who lived in Palestine and who describes her
pilgrimage and her building of churches there at consid-
erable length. Newman's argument to the contrary in his
Essays on Miracles is only an illustration of Gibbon's say-
ing that " The silence of Eusebius and the Bordeaux pil-
grim, which satisfies those who think, perplexes those who
believe." ^

There are early references to the finding of the cross;
e. g., by Cyril of Jerusalem vv^ithin twenty-five years after
Helena's pilgrimage. But this, at most, shows that the
empress mother may have taken back with her from Jeru-
salem what purported to be relics of the true cross. This
much of an historical basis for the legend can not, of course,
be disproved.

3. Later Legends of C onstantine' s Birth and Rise to Lm~
perial Position
Long after the time of Constantine, romances^ — they can
hardly be called legends — sprang up about his mother,
Helena, his father, Constantius, and about his own birth.
The best known of these is that told by Geoffrey of Mon-
mouth ^ and Pierre Langloft " and mentioned by Henry of
Huntington,* Richard of Cirencester, Voragine, and others.
This is to the effect that Constantius was sent to Britain by
the Senate, and was made king there, and married Helena,
daughter of Duke Coel, and that Constantine was thus the
son of a British princess.^

^ Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ed. Bury, vol. ii, p. 456 n.
The Bordeaux pilgrim " is the anonymous itinerary of a pilgrimage
to the Holy Land in 333. Cf. Migne, P. L. vol. viii, col. 783 et seq.
2 V, 6. 3 pp, 66-67. * i» 37-

^ For a short sketch of this and other stories, and for other refer-
ences, see Richardson's " Prolegomena " in Nicene and Post Nicene
Fathers, Second Series, vol. i, Eusebius, p. 441. A story in Hakluyt's
Voyages, 2 (1810), p. 34, attributes angelic virtues and superhuman

I2l]

CONSTANTINE'S ORIGIN AND RISE

121

A still wilder romance is that edited by Heydenreich in
1879 from a fourteenth-century manuscript. It makes
Helena a noble pilgrim to Rome who was violated by the
emperor Constantius. The son she bore was named Con-
stantine and after remarkable adventures was recognized
by Constantius and made heir to the empire/ This legend
had been traced back to a seventh or eighth century story,
which was apparently widespread in two general types,
Greek and Latin. The Greek story seems to be the earlier
and simpler. It is to the effect that Constantius, on his re-
turn from a victory over the Sarmatians, had intercourse
at an inn with a heathen maid, Helena, with whom he left
imperial insignia. Later, seeking a worthy heir to the
throne, in place of his legitimate but feeble-minded son,
he sent out an official who stopped at the same inn. Hel-
ena's son attracted his attention, and also his displeasure, by
mounting one of the royal horses, but when Helena told
that her son was the offspring of the emperor and displayed
the purple robe, the boy was taken to Rome. Here he was
trained in the command of troops and, as Constantine, be-
came the emperor's heir. The Latin form varied in many
places from this story and added many embellishments, such
as Helena's pilgrimage to Rome as a Christian and her vio-
lation on the journey by the emperor, his rearing of her
son at Rome and the son's distinguished bearing in a tour-
ney, and his recognition thereafter as the emperor's heir.
A romantic episode of a plot by certain merchants at Rome
also crept into the story. Constantine is represented as hav-
ing been abducted by these merchants and palmed off upon

knowledge to this British princess Helena, and tells of her pilgrim-
age to Jerusalem, her death at Rome, and the preservation of her
body in Venice.

1 Heydenreich (ed), Incerti Auctoris de Constantino Magno ejusque
Matre Helena, Leipsic, 1879.

122 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [122

the Greek emperor as a prince, so that he married his daugh-
ter to the young man, and sent the couple back to the West,
in charge of the merchants, with rich presents. The mer-
chants deserted the couple and made off with the booty.
Constantine and his bride were rescued, and eventually
came to their own.^

But these stories and others equally fanciful take us be-
yond the borderline of legends into the realm of pure
romance. In many of them the use of Constantine's name,
rather than that of any other notable, seems merely acci-
dental ; it is only the device of the story-teller to add inter-
est to his tale.

1 For a detailed study of these legends, cf. E. Heydenreich, " Con-
stantin der Grosse in den Sagen des Mittelalters," Deutsch. Zeitsch. /.
Geschichtswissenschaft ix (1893), pp. 1-27.

CHAPTER III

The Hostile, Pagan Legend of Constantine

I. Its M eagerness

The hostile, pagan legend of Constantine is compara-
tively slight, surprisingly so in view of the significance of
his reign for paganism. One finds less than one would ex-
pect of the virulence and bitterness and wild imagination
that characterized, for instance, the popular Catholic stories
of Luther, or the southern version of Lincoln during the
Civil War. This is in part explained by the destruction of
pagan society and literature which the two centuries after
Constantine brought about. Possibly pagan legends afloat
at the time disappeared so completely that we can find no
trace of them. Yet a number of pagan writings remain.
Eutropius, the Scriptores Historiae Augustae, Sextus Au-
relius Victor, Praxagoras Atheniensis, Julian, Libanius,
Ammianus Marcellinus, Eunapius, are represented to-day
by fragments considerable enough to insure some reference
to most of the pagan stories about the first Christian em-
peror. Furthermore, the Christian writers themselves so
often quote adversaries whom they refute that we can count
upon them giving a clue to most legends invented or be-
lieved in by the opponents of their faith. Yet it is after
all a meagre yield that a search of this literature reveals.
The explanation must, therefore, in part be sought in the
fact ment^'oned above that contemporary paganism scarcely
realized that Constantine's reign marked the beginning of
the end of the older religions.^

^ Cf. supra, pp. 66-67.
123] 123

124

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[124

2. Emperor Julian's Version of Constantine
The emperor Julian, the failure of whose effort to restore
paganism and to discredit Christianity showed how far the
revolution had gone and how permanent it promised to be,
gives us our first glimpse of a pagan legend hostile to the
great Constantine, his own uncle. In his formal writings
and orations, which he was fond of composing, Julian gen-
erally observed the utmost of imperial decorum. He gave
measured and stately praise to his predecessors, even those
of his own family. In one of his orations, however, that
on the Cynic Heracleion,^ the imperial orator made a veiled
attack upon Constantine. He tells a long and curious fable
about a man who attained great wealth, partly by inheri-
tance and partly by acquisitions which he made, " wishing
to get rich by fair means or foul, for he cared little for the
gods His success was due to a certain knack and to luck,
rather than to any real ability. At his death there came
massacre and confusion, a natural ^result of his unscrupu-
lousness and of the example he set his sons.^ The rich man
of the parable is none other than Constantine; the parable
itself nothing but a bitterly hostile interpretation of his
reign.

In " The Caesars however, Julian made an open at-
tack upon the first Christian emperor. This work is an
attempt at light literature, a satire written for the Satur-
nalia in the winter following Julian's accession to the throne.
It purports to describe a Saturnalian Symposium which
Romulus gives in honor of the gods, and to which the
Roman emperors and Alexander of Macedon are invited.
The emperors are discussed as they are introduced at the

• " Upog UpaKXe/ov Kvvikov.^' Oratio vii in Hertlein's edition of Julian's
works.

' Ibid., vol. i, p. 295.

125] ™^ PAGAN LEGEND 125

banquet, and as they contend for the prize of merit, and
again at the end of the book, as they are asked their sev-
eral ambitions and assigned to their proper divine patrons.
On each occasion JuHan decries Constantine's character and
deeds. His admission to the contest for the highest place
among the emperors is challenged by Dionysos on the
ground of his imperfections and his lack of zeal for the
gods, and he is finally grudgingly admitted to the contest
as a man " not lacking valor, but entirely mastered by
pleasure and dissipation." ^

In pleading his cause Constantine is embarrassed by con-
sciousness of the pettiness of his achievements for, if the
truth must be told, of the tyrants he overcame, one was un-
warlike and effeminate, and the other unfortunate and in-
capacitated by age, and both were hated by gods and men.
As to the barbarians, his efforts against them were laugh-
able, for he gave them tribute, and spent everything on
pleasure." ^ After looking lovingly at the Moon, and after
a vainglorious speech, Constantine was put to shame by
Silenus, the clown of the symposium, in a joking compari-
son of his deeds to hothouse plants that were green for a
little, but soon withered.^ Later, after an exalted discourse
by Marcus Aurelius, the hero of the booklet, on his desire
" to be like the gods ", Hennes asked Constantine, " And
what do you consider noble?" "To get great sums," he
said, " and to spend them upon your own desires, and in
gratifying those of your friends." *

At the close of " The Caesars ", as each emperor chooses
his patron, occurs the following remarkable passage:

^Julian, Opera, Ed. Hertlein, i, p. 408, 1. 6-16.

^ Ihid., i, p. 422, 1. 7-15.

3 Ihid., i, p. 422, 1. 15 — p. 423, 1. 18.

^ Ihid., \, p. 430, 1. 4-8.

126

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[126

But Constantine, not finding among the gods a pattern for his
hfe, perceiving Wantonness near, ran to her. And she, re-
ceiving him tenderly, and embracing him, covered him with
flowery feminine robes, and led him to Perdition ('A^wWa),
so that he found Jesus, who turned around and harangued
them all : Whoever is a seducer, whoever is defiled with
blood, whoever is under a curse and abominable, come hither
boldly, for, washing him in this water, I will make him imm'e-
diately pure, and if he falls again into the same faults, I will
make him pure again when he beats his breast and knocks his
head." And he very gladly staid with him and led his chil-
dren from the assembly of the gods. But the demons, aven-
gers of blood, tormented him, and them no less, administering
justice for the blood of kindred; until Zeus, on account of
Claudius and Constantine, made them desist.^

This is, of course, an echo of the old accusation that the
Christians v^elcomed the scum of the earth into their fel-
lowship and encouraged crime by the promise of forgive-
ness.^ It may have been adapted, as a parody, from the
words of Eusebius in his Oration in Praise of Constantine,*
" as a gracious Saviour and physician of the soul, calls on
the Greek and the Barbarian, the wise and the unlearned,
the rich and the poor, the servant and his master, the sub-
ject and his lord, the ungodly, the profane, the ignorant,
the evil-doer, the blasphemer, alike to draw near, and hasten
to receive his heavenly cure."

If the passage in question be a genuine part of " The

1 Julian, Opera Ed. Hertlein, i, 431, 1. 7 et seq. The text of this pas-
sage is uncertain. Some of the best MSS. omit the reference to Jesus
and his speech, others read "the son" instead of "Jesus." I have fol-
lowed the reading adopted by Hertlein in the body of his text.

^ For a philosophical discussion of this charge and of the potency of
conversion in working a moral transformation, cf. Origen, Contra Cel-
sum. Book iii, chapters 62-69.

3 Chapter xi, 5.

127]

THE PAGAN LEGEND

127

Caesars," as I think it is, it expresses Julian's scorn of the
Christian idea of conversion, and especially of the idea of
the magic efficacy of baptism. Its implied denunciation of
Constantine, "whoever is a seducer, whoever is defiled with
blood, whoever is under a curse and abominable," is one of
the bitterest attacks that has survived. The punishment of
Constantine which followed when the demons, avengers
of blood, tormented him and them [Constantine's sons]
no less, administering justice for the blood of kindred "
serves to emphasize the mockery of the parody. In the
whole passage the killing of relatives is emphasized de-
filed with blood " under a curse " avengers of blood ",
" justice for the blood of kindred ") as the greatest crime
of Constantine. This bloodguiltiness coupled with the
Christian promise of ready forgiveness and purification
through baptism, are the elements which gave rise to the
pagan legend of Constantine's conversion. Owing to the
satirical vein in which The Caesars " is written, it is, per-
haps, not safe to infer that Julian actually attributed Con-
stantine's adoption of Christianity to the promise which
was held out to him of pardon for a profligate career and
for the murder of kindred. But, that Constantine was a
reprobate and that his adoption of Christianity was at once
a sign and a completion of his moral turpitude, is plainly
the burden of Julian's story. This, whether original with
Julian or current before he wrote, is a palpable distortion
of Constantine's career. The execution of his son, Crispus,
his wife, Fausta, and other near relatives, is proven, but
there is no historical evidence that he sought in Christianity
release from remorse for these executions within his family
circle. Indeed, such a view is rendered impossible, not only
by Constantine's postponement of baptism and his general
attitude toward the church, but by the fact that he was
committed to the new religion before these executions, and
by many other considerations.

128 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [128

3. Developijient of the Pagan Legend of Constantine

Certain it is, however, that the legend soon became cur-
rent among pagan writers that Constantine became a
Christian because that religion alone received him after the
execution of his son and wife, and promised him forgive-
ness for the great crimes he had committed. Count Zosi-
mus, one of the best-knowm pagan writers of the fifth cen-
tury, incorporated the story in his Historia Nova. He is a
partisan and not a first-rate authority as to the history of
the fourth century ; his work is largely a mediocre compila-
tion from Eunapius and Olympiodorus. These very con-
siderations, however, make his narrative invaluable as a
source for the current pagan version of Constantine's rela-
tion to Christianity. He asserted that Constantine was a
pagan until late in his reign. Then, after he had executed
his son Crispus, an able and excellent young man, and his
wife Fausta. he was stricken w^ith remorse and asked the
philosopher Sopater how he might obtain expiation. So-
pater replied that for such crimes no expiation was possible.
An Egyptian priest, however, coming from Spain (prob-
ably to be identified with Hosius) held forth the promise of
forgiveness through repentance and baptism, and gained an
ascendancy over the emperor w-hich could be accounted for
only by magic. Constantine turned therefore to Christian-
ity for relief and became an adherent of that religion.^

^ Zosimus, Historia Nova, ii, 29, 3. Stated also, and refuted in Sozo-
men, i, 5. Seeck {Untergang d. antiken Welt, iii, 213, 477) assumes a
common source from which the Epitome of Victor, the account of Zosi-
mus, and that of John the Monk in the Vita S. Artemii (AA.SS.,
8th October) draw, which stated that Fausta charged Crispus with
offering her violence. Crispus was therefore executed; then Helena
persuaded Constantine that Fausta was the guilty one, and induced
him to kill her by an overheated bath. Then Constantine repented, the
heathen priests declared that his deeds could not be expiated, Chris-
tianity offered forgiveness, so he became a Christian.

129]

THE PAGAN LEGEND

I2g

This account, growing, possibly, out of Julian's satire
and developed by an unknown writer whose work was used
by Zosimus and others, received doubtless various embel-
lishments. We find a much later writer, Codinus (about
1450), who in part used earlier sources now lost, touching
up the story of Crispus' death with the statement that Con-
stantine afterwards erected a statue of Crispus in pure
silver with the inscription " My unjustly treated son ", and
did further penance/

This pagan legend had a comparatively small sphere of
action for it was quickly denied by Christian writers ^ and
received little credence in later Christian centuries. Sozo-
men's refutation of Zosimus is probably the best one. It is
to the effect that Crispus " did not die till the twentieth
year of his father's reign, and many laws framed with his
sanction are still extant" as "can be proved by referring to
the dates affixed." That Sopater, or Sosipater as he calls
him, could hardly have dwelt in Gaul, in Britain, or in the
neighboring countries, in which, it is universally admitted,
Constantine embraced the religion of the Christians, pre-
vious to his war with Maxentius, and prior to his return
to Rome and Italy; and this is evidenced by the dates of the
laws which he enacted in favor of religion." And further-
more a pagan philosopher would not be ignorant that Her-
cules was purified at Athens by the celebration of the mys-
teries of Ceres, after the murder of his children and of his
guest, and that the Greeks [i. e., pagans] held that purifica-
tion from guilt of this nature could be obtained.

Evagrius' refutation of Sozimus is far inferior to that
of Sozomen. He first refutes in a most quixotic fashion

1 De signo, ed. Bekker, Bonn, 1843, pp. 62-63.

2 E. g., iSozomen, i, 5 ; Evagrius, iii, 40-41 ; Cyril, adv. Julian, book vii.
' Book iii, chaps, 40, 41.

130 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [130

Sozimus' declaration that Constantine imposed a new tax,
chrysargyrium, upon merchants and others including pub-
lic harlots, by citing instances of Constantine's liberality in
the building of Constantinople and toward the army, adding
" How thou canst then maintain that the same person could
be so liberal, so munificent, and at the same time so paltry
and sordid, as to impose so accursed a tax, I am utterly un-
able to comprehend." That is, Constantine spent so much
money it is impossible to think of him levying such a tax!
He proceeds to prove that Constantine did not execute
either Fausta or Crispus by adducing tributes to Constan-
tine's mildness by Eusebius, his Christian panegyrist, and
by the passage in Eusebius' Church History ^ in which Cris-
pus is commended, and these he clinches as follows : " Euse-
bius, who survived Constantine, would never have praised
Crispus in these terms, if he had been destroyed by his
father." To modern writers, this passage is merely one of
the proofs that the Church History was written before the
execution of Crispus in 326 and was not revised at this
point. The contention that Crispus was not executed at
all, is one of the instances in which the defense of Constan-
tine overshot the mark.

It was the eventual supremacy of Christianity and the
disappearance of paganism as a distinct power, perhaps
more than the arguments of Christian historians, that sup-
pressed this pagan legend of Constantine's conversion.

^ X, 9.

CHAPTER IV

EARLY LEGENDS OF DIVINE AID, CONVERSION^ AND
SAINTLINESS

I. Pagan and Christian Legends of Divine Aid

While Constantine was yet a pagan, in Gaul, pagan ora-
tors extolled the peculiar solicitude of the gods for him..
Reference has already been made to Eumenius' description,
in his paneg}Tic of 310, of the close tie between Constantine
and Apollo.^ Pagan orators also attributed divine aid to
Constantine in his earlier Gallic wars, and in his Italian
campaign against Maxentius."

The panegyric of 313, to quote one of a dozen similar
passages, describes Constantine as having access in the for-

1 Cf. supra, p. 75 et seq.

' Seeck, op. cit., i, 491, Richardson, in Xicene and Post Nicene Fathers
(second series, vol. i), Eusebius, p. 490, and others assert that these
pagan panegyrists, and the phrase instinctu divinitatis " on the tri-
umphal arch refer vaguely to the vision of the monogram. They over-
look the fact that Eumenius described a peculiar intimacy betweea
Constantine and heavenly powers in the panegyric of 310, before the
campaign against Maxentius (cf. supra, p. 75).

Nazarius, the pagan panegyrist, also predicates divine protection for
Constantine on several different occasions and uses the phrase " divino
instinctu " with reference to an entirely different situation from that
described by Lactantius. Nazarius, Paneg. (in Paneg. Vet., No. X)
chaps. 14-17, 19, 26; and Inrerti Paneg., probably by Nazarius, in
313 (in Paneg. Vet., No. ix) chaps. 2 et seq.; in Migne. P. L.; viii,
cols. 592-595 and cols. 655 ef seq.. respectively. Cf.. also, infra, p. 132^
n. 2, end.
131]

132

COXSTAXTIXE AXD CHRISTIAXITY

mation of his plans to the supreme divine wisdom while
other mortals are left to the care of the lesser eods/ The
story of heavenly warriors seen marching in behalf of
Constantine before a decisive engagement is told first in a
pagan source, the panegyric of Nazarius at Rome in 321.
He tells how all Gaul talked of the vision of celestial armies,
led, in the opinion of the orator, by Constantius, flying to
the aid of Constantine at the beginning of the war with
Maxentius." He believes that this celestial army has al-
ways been fighting for Constantine but is now for the first
time revealed to other men. His deduction is not that Con-
stantine received a revelation of the Christian god, but that
after witnessing this heavenly apparition men have no rea-

1 Quisnam te Deus, quae tam praesens hortata est majestas, ut om-
nibus fere tuis comitibus et ducibus non solum tacite mussantibus seci
etiam aperte timentibus, contra consilia hominum contra haruspicum
monita ipse per temet liberandae urbis tempus venisse sentires? Habes
profecto aliquod cum ilia mente divina, Constantine, secretum, quae
delegata nostri diis minoribus cura, uni se tibi dignatur ostendere.
Incerti Paneg., in Paneg. Vet., no. ix, chap, 2, in Migne, P. L., viii, col.
655.

^ In ore denique est omnium Galliarum, exercitus visos qui se divi-
nitus missos prae se ferebant. Et quamvis coelestia sub oculos homi-
num venire non soleant, quod crassam et caligantem aciem simplex et
inconcreta substantia naturae tenuis eludat; illi tamen auxiliatores tui
aspici audirique patientes, ubi meritum tuum testificati sunt, mortalis
visus contagium refugerunt. Sed quaenam ilia fuisse dicitur species?
qui vigor corporum? quae amplitudo membrorum? quae alacritas vol-
untatum? Flagrabant verendum nescio quid umbone corusci, et coeles-
tium armorum lux terribilis ardebat; tales enim venerant, ut tui cre-
derentur. Haec ipsorum sermocinatio, hoc inter audientes ferebant.
Constantinum petimus, Constantino imus auxilio. Habent profecto et
divina jactantiam, et coelestia quoque tangit ambitio. Illi coelo lapsi,
illi divinitus missi gloriabantur quod tibi militabant. Duccbat hos,
credo, Constantius pater, qui terrarum triumphis altiori tibi cesserat, di-
vinas expeditiones jam divus agitabat. Magnus hie quoque pietatis
tuae fructus, quod quamvis particeps coeli ampliorem se fieri gratia
tua senserit, et cujus munera in alios influere jam possent, in eum
ipsum tua munera redundarint. Nazarius, Paneg., chap. 14, in Migne,
P. L., viii. cols. 592-593. Cf. ibid., chap. 16, "Quis est hominum quin
opitulari tibi deum credat?" This in reference to Constantine's early
campaigns in Gaul against Ascarius and Regaisus.

133] EARLY LEGEXDS 1 33

son now to doubt the story that Castor and Pollux took
visible part in battles of old/

A somewhat similar occurrence is described as taking
place in the decisive campaign against Licin'us. But this
time the narration comes from a Christian writer, none
other than Eusebius, the '* father of Church History and
dates from a time shortly after Constantine's death, long
after the favorite of the gods had cast in his fortunes with
the Christians. Eusebius tells how detachments of Con-
stantine's army were seen marching through cities at noon-
day, though in reality not a single soldier was present at the
time. He adds, This appearance was seen through the
agency of divine and superior power." - Eusebius' account
was written at least fifteen years later than Xazarius' ; if
there is any direct connection between the two the idea of
miraculous manifestations in behalf of Constantine must
have been suggested to the Christian by the pagan. Nq
connection, however, can be proved, and it is more probable
that each merely gave utterance to popular tales current in
his own environment.

The historical fact seems to be that direct intervention of
God or gods, angels or demons, figured in most stories of
great events, whether narrated by Christians or pagans.
Constantine's pagan eulogists in Gaul, or from Gaul,
extolled the activities of the gods in his behalf at least
as late as the year three hundred and twenty-one. As
Constantine's victories turned to the benefit of the Chris-
tians, they, in turn, assumed a direct interposition of
their God in his affairs. As we have seen. Constan-
tine used Christian emblems as his luck tokens as
early as the year three hundred and twelve, but he took
no action that precipitated an open, violent break with

* Op. cit., chaps. 19 and 15 respectively.

^ Life of Constantine, ii. 6. For another instance of divine aid cited
by Eusebius, cf. ibid., i, 47.

2 34 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [134

paganism. The future was with the Christians. Though
Nazarius could give the pagan interpretation of Constan-
tine's marvelous victories as late as 321, the emperor him-
self became more and more definitely Christian in his ideas
and in his policy. It was the Christian god who fought for
him and gave him the victory.

This fact, if we may believe Eusebius, found recognition
in Constantine's preparations for battle, as well as in the
superstitious reverence paid to the Christian labarum. In
the old days the Roman armies had their praetorian altars,
their questioning of the omens before important actions,
and their rituals for gaining the favor of the gods. Con-
stantine's new faith sought precisely the same objects as
did the old pagan worship, but it was directed toward an-
other deity and found somewhat different expression. He
is said, in preparation for battle, to have pitched a taber-
nacle of the cross outside the camp and to have retired to
-it to pray. " And making earnest supplications to God, he
was always honored after a little with a manifestation of
His presence. And then, as if moved by a divine impulse,
he would rush from the tabernacle, and suddenly give
orders to his army to move at once, without delay, and on
the instant to draw their swords." ^ This last corresponds
with what we know of his military tactics ; a sudden, irre-
sistible assault won most of his battles. The tabernacle
outside the camp, and the mysterious consulting of the
-deity suggest forms of divining common among primitive
•and even more advanced peoples ; it may well be regarded
in this case as a Christian substitute for the pagan practice
of consulting the omens. Some suggestion of details came
perhaps from the narratives in the Old Testament about
Moses and the tabernacle.^ The comparison of Constan-

1 EuSebius, Life of Constantine, ii, 12-14. For the labarum, cf. supra,
■pp. 106-107.

^ Cf. especially, Ex. xxxiii, 7 et seq.

135] EARLY LEGENDS I35

tine to Moses was, at least, common among Christian
writers; Eusebius repeatedly likened him to a new Moses,
in the events of his life and in his divine mission.^ With
no other Jewish or Christian worthy was he so frequently
compared.

Sozomen embellished Eusebius' account with details about
the tabernacle, and adds the significant statement, From
that period the Roman legions, which now were called by
their number, provided each its own tent, with attendant
priests and deacons." ^ The Roman army was now defi-
nitely under the auspices of the God of the Christians.
Legends of the miraculous aid of pagan gods had given
place altogether to legends of the aid which the true God
had vouchsafed to Constantine. It is little wonder that in
the fifth century many a pagan writer found that the facts
of his own time gave little ground for belief in any divinei
aid whatever being granted to the Roman legions and at-
tributed the decline of the Empire to its desertion of its old
religion.

2. Early Legends of C onstantine' s Miraculous Conversion

It was inevitable that Constantine's support of Christian-
ity would be attributed sooner or later to a miraculous con-
version. This is shown by the different legends upon the
subject which sprang up at various times from independent
origins. The earliest, and the most famous, comes direct
from Eusebius and perhaps ultimately from Constantine
himself. We have seen that the former's eulogistic Life of
the latter is full of references to continued supernatural
revelations of God vouchsafed to the emperor. Most of
these references are known only to those who have read

1 C/. Church History, ix, 9, 5; 8; Life of Constantine, i, 12.
' Ecclesiastical History, i, 8.

136 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [135

the Life, but the story of the first of these revelations is
familiar to all. Eusebius not only gave a circumstantial ac-
count of the manifestation, but in this connection ascribes
the emperor's conversion to it. The campaign, therefore,
v^hich furnished pagan panegyrists v^ith their last opportu-
nity to picture the intervention of their gods on Constan-
tine's behalf, became to a large part of the Christian world
not only its first opportunity to portray its God as the ar-
biter of victory, but the setting of a magnificent picture of
the miraculous conversion of the great emperor to its
faith.

The importance of this legend justifies its description in
the v^ords of its earliest narrator. Eusebius tells how Con-
stantine was moved at the thought of the tyrannous oppres-
sion of Rome by Maxentius to attempt the overthrow of
the tyrant. Knowing the insufficiency of his own military
forces on account of the wicked and magical enchant-
ments which were so diligently practiced by the tyrant, he
sought divine assistance." Pondering over the contrast be-
tween the prosperous career of his own father, who had
" honored the one Supreme God during his whole life," and
the unhappy end of those who had put their trust in other
gods, he felt it incumbent on him to honor his father's
God alone."

Accordingly he called on him with earnest prayer and sup-
plications that he would reveal to him who he was, and stretch
forth his right hand to help him in his present difficulties.
And while he was thus praying with fervent entreaty, a most
marvelous sign appeared to him from heaven, the account of
which it might have been hard to believe had it been related
by any other person. But since the victorious emperor himself
long afterwards declared it to the writer of this history, when
he was honored with his acquaintance and society, and con-
firmed his statement by an oath, who could hesitate to

127] EARLY LEGENDS 1 37

accredit the relation, especially since the testimony of after-
time has established its truth ? He said that about noon, when
the day was already beginning to decline, he saw with his own
eyes the trophy of a cross of light in the heavens, above the
sun, and bearing the inscription, " Conquer by this." At this
sight he himself was struck with amazement, and his whole
army also, which followed him on this expedition and wit-
nessed the miracle.

He said, moreover, that he doubted within himself what the
import of this apparition could be. And while he continued to
ponder and reason on its meaning, night suddenly came on;
then in his sleep the Christ of God appeared to him with the
same sign which he had seen in the heavens and commanded
him to make a likeness of that sign which he had seen in the
heavens, and to use it as a safeguard in all engagements with
his enemies.

At dawn of day he arose, and communicated the marvel to
his friends : and then, calling together the workers in gold and
precious stones, he sat in the midst of them and described to
them the figure of the sign he had seen, bidding them repre-
sent it in gold and precious stones. And this representation I
myself have had an opportunity of seeing. . . . But at the
time above specified, being struck with amazement at the ex-
traordinary vision and resolving to worship no other God save
him who had appeared to him, he sent for those who were
acquainted with the mysteries of His doctrine, and enquired
who that God was, and what was intended by the sign of the
vision he had seen.

They affirmed that He was God, the only-begotten Son of
the one and only God: that the sign which had appeared was
the symbol of immortality, and the trophy of that victory over
death which he had gained in time past when sojourning on
earth. . . .

He determined thenceforth to devote himself to the read-
ing of the Inspired writings.

Moreover, he made the priests of God his counselors, and

138 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [138

deemed it incumbent on him to honor God who had ap-
peared to him with all devotion.^

That the miraculous mid-day vision of the monogram of
Christ in the heaven is legend and not fact, admits of little
doubt. ^ Eusebius, himself, in his Church History, written
much nearer the time of the campaign against Maxentius,
makes no mention of it, or indeed of any conversion " of
Constantine to Christianity. We have considerable con-
temporary material upon the campaign, and this episode
finds no place in it. Lactantius seems altogether our best
witness. His account is simple and straightforward. He
tells that Constantine was directed in a dream to cause the
heavenly sign to be put on the shields of his soldiers, that
he did so, and won the battle. ^ There is here no reference
to a supernatural vision at mid-day, nor to Constantine's
being converted to Christianity.

There is ample evidence of Constantine's use of the
monogram of Christ, but aside from the passage just quoted
from Eusebius there is no evidence that this originated from
a miraculous vision. The repetition of the story by his
continuators adds no weight to his narrative. Monumental
references, sculpture and inscriptions, from the time of
Constantine, have been found in many places setting forth
his triumph.* These give no portrayal of a heavenly vision.
The wellnigh universal attitude of contemporary Christians
was that God had given Constantine the victory, and that

1 Eusebius, Life of Constantine, i, 26-32, Eng. trans, in N. and P. N.
F., Eusebius, pp. 488-491.

2 Cf. supra, p. 77 et seq.

^ De mortibus persecutorum, 44.

* For a practically complete list and short descriptions of these, cf.
E. Becker, " Protest gegen den Kaiserkult und Verherrlichung des
Sieges am Pons Milvius in der altchristlichen Kunst der konstantin-
ischen Zeit," in Konstantin der Crosse u. s. Zeit, ed. Dolger.

ioq] early legends 139

his enemies had perished in the Tiber, precisely as God had
given Moses the victory by the overthrow of Pharaoh's
host in the Red Sea. All contemporary comparisons of
Constantine to scriptural heroes liken him to Moses. Had
there been any heavenly vision, it is inconceivable that
there should be no reference to it other than Eusebius',
and it is inconceivable also that no one should have
thought of comparing Constantine's vision with that
of the Apostle Paul. How natural this would have been
is shown by the fact that Theodoret in his continu-
ation of Eusebius summarizes in that comparison his pre-
decessor's account, speaking of Constantine as " a prince
deserving of the highest praise, who like the divine apostle,
was not called by man or through man, but by God." ^

Eusebius tells his story under circumstances which make
its truthfulness highly improbable, even were it not con-
tradicted by other evidence. He tells it as a piece of news
at least twenty-four years after the event. He writes about
a wonder which occurred in the other half of the Roman
Empire and which left no impression in that part of the
Empire. Pie anticipates his reader's incredulity by admit-
ting his own, and asserting that the emperor told him the
story " long afterwards " in conversation and confirmed it
with an oath. He was not himself intimate with the em-
peror and saw him only on rare occasions ; it was there-
fore improbable that he possessed genuine inside informa-
tion of the emperor's early career.^ He has nothing to say
of the cross in the heavens in his Oration in Praise of Con-
stantine delivered in the presence of his hero and full of
allusions to the revelations with which God had favored
him, but describes it only after the emperor's death.^ It is

^ i, 2. For comparison of Constantine to Moses, cf. Eusebius, Church
History, ix, 9; Life of Constantine, i, 12, 20, 38.

2 Cf. Life of Constantine, iv, 33, 39.

3 The allusion in chap. 6, 21, would apply to a dream as well as, or
better than, to a heavenly apparition.

140 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [140

possible that Constantine, never averse to enhancing the
esteem in which churchmen, and others for that matter,
held him, in conversation with Eusebius late in his life may-
have embellished the facts relating to his adoption of the
heavenly sign and may even have given the bishop hints
from which his later narration developed/ Indeed, Con-
stantine's own later memories of the campaign may have
developed by some process of auto-suggestion into some-
thing like a germ of Eusebius' story.

The legend thus given birth was embodied, usually with
a few additions or modifications, in all of Eusebius' con-
tinuators.^ Philostorgius makes the vision a greater celes-
tial display than did his predecessors. " As to the cause of the
conversion of Constantine from heathen superstition to the
Christian faith, Philostorgius, in conformity with all other
writers, ascribes it to his victory over Maxentius, in a battle
in which the sign of the cross was seen in the East, vast in
extent and lit up with glorious light, and surrounded on
each side by stars like a rainbow, symbolizing the form of
letters. The letters, too, were in the Latin tongue and
formed these words, ' In hoc signo vinces '." ^ The soldiers
are in most accounts represented as witnessing the phe-
nomenon, and a document is in existence purporting to give
the testimony of an eye-witness in the army, St. Artemius,
afterwards a martyr.^ The Vita S. Artemii, however, is
a crude document from a later date and entitled to no cre-
dence in this connection.

In the West, where the occurrence is represented as hav-
ing taken place, it seems to have been known to few, if any,
writers. Gibbon remarked that the advocates for the

1 Cf. supra, p. 106.

2 Sozomen, i, 3-4; Socrates, i, 2; Theodoret, who begins with the
Arian controversy, refers to it in i, 2 ; Philostorgius, i, 6.

^ i, 6, as preserved by Photius.

* October (8th) 20th in Acta Sanctorum.

j^l] EARLY LEGENDS 141

vision are unable to produce a single testimony from the
Fathers of the fourth and fifth centuries, who, in their vol-
uminous v/ritings, repeatedly celebrate the triumph of the
church and of Constantine." ^ This is certainly true so far
as Western writers are concerned. Jerome makes no men-
tion of it whatever, nor does Augustine, though both writers
had ample occasion to do so.

Another, and quite contradictory legend of Constantine's
conversion, through the agency of Bishop Sylvester (314-
336), gained credence some generations later, and this Euse-
bian legend remained quite in the background until its com-
petitor was thoroughly discredited at the beginning of mod-
ern times. It then became a favorite theme of ecclesiastical
writers and in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
became a common subject of discussion in doctoral disser-
tations and elsewhere. In modern times it has unquestion-
ably been the most popular of all Constantinian legends.

It has this in common with the hostile, pagan legend of
Constantine's career, previously described, that it assumes
a sudden and radical conversion of the emperor to Chris-
tianity. We have already seen that such a violent break
with paganism, and such an instantaneous and complete ac-
ceptance of Christianity is not indicated by the historical
evidence. Zosimus, the pagan, and Eusebius, the Chris-
tian (in his Life of Constantine), exaggerated and intensi-
fied the process of conversion, the former to the discredit,
the latter to the glory of the champion of the Supreme
God.

3. Legends of Saintliness

Irrespective of the manner of his conversion, Constan-
tine's support, and final adoption, of Christianity became,
for all writers belonging to that faith, the central fact of

^ Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ed. Bury, vol. ii, p. 305, n.
52.

142 CONSTANTJNE AND CHRISTIANITY [142

his reign, the fact that colored all his acts and determined
his personal character. Thus arose the legend which pic-
tured him as a man of extraordinary piety, of saintly life,
and of constant communion with God. Eusebius repre-
sents him as rebuking a panegyrist for prophesying that he,
the emperor, was destined to share the empire of the Son of
God in the world to come.^ It was, however, only such
bold flights of fancy as this, from the lips of awkward
orators, that drew the imperial rebuke. Eusebius himself
is not much more restrained in the praise of his ruler's
character and of his favor with God. We have already
seen how one-sided and fulsome with praise of the em-
peror's piety are both his Oration in Praise of Constantine
and his Life of Constantine. In both, the emperor was de-
scribed as without faults or vices, living a life wholly de-
voted to the service of God. His palace, in vvhich dark
intrigues took place which led, justly or unjustly, to the
execution of his son and his wife, was described as modeled
into a church of God. ^ Though there are strong reasons
for thinking that during most of his reign he maintained
irregular connection with women which, if not frowned
upon by contemporary society, was contrary to all the teach-
ings of Christianity, he was spoken of as superior to sexual
desire.^ He was, in short, one " whose character is formed
after the divine original of the Supreme Sovereign, and
whose mind reflects, as in a mirror, the radiance of his vir-
tues." *

Constantine is said to have built a church of the apostles
in Constantinople as his own sepulchre, " anticipating with
extraordinary fervor of faith that his body would share

^ Life of Constantine, iv, 48.
' Life of Constantine, iv, 17.

3 Oration in Praise of Constantine, v, 4. Cf. supra, p. go et seq,
* Ibid. Cf. also, Life of Constantine, i, 3.

143] EARLY LEGENDS I43

their title with the apostles themselves, and that he should
thus even after death become the subject, with them, of the
devotions which should be performed to their honor in this
place. He accordingly caused twelve coffins to be set up
in this church, like sacred pillars in honor and memory of
the apostolic number, in the center of which his own was
placed. . . ^ If his motive in this be correctly repre-
sented, it confirms other facts which indicate that he appre-
ciated to the full the character which others gave him for
piety, and even exerted himself to heighten his reputation
in this respect.

The legend of Constantine's extraordinary Christian vir-
tues was accepted in full by the continuators of the Church
History of his first biographer; Sozomen, Socrates, Theo-
doret, Philostorgius, Evagrius, and, with reservations, in
the West, by Jerome. The former add very little to our
historical knowledge of Constantine, but they continued and
amplified the legend of the emperor as an ideal Christian
saint. In the East, especially, where men knew best the
last phase of his life, 323-337, when he was more closely
and publicly allied with the church than he had been before
that, and where the fierceness of the Diocletian persecution
made his reign most grateful, imagination glorified his
memory. He came finally to be regarded as a saint in the
Eastern Church with a festal day observed annually with
great ceremony, at Constantinople, the city which he had
founded.^ He was called Isapostolos, " equal with the
apostles," and according to Anna Comnena was counted
among the apostles.^ Long before this, Theodoret had

^ Life of Constantine, iv, 60. Told also by subsequent writers, some
of whom were familiar with the churches of Constantinople.
' Cf. Acta Sanctorum, on May 21, pp. 13, 14. The Chronicon Alex-
andrium tells of the ceremony.

'Alexias, 14, 8.

144

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[144

made the comparison by describing him as " a prince de-
serving of the highest praise, who, Hke the divine apostle,
was not called by man or through man, but by God." ^

In the West Constantine did not quite attain such high
rank, but he was nevertheless held in high repute as a
notable Christian and classed as a saint. An equestrian
statue adorning the facades of some churches in parts of
France has been held by many archaeologists to represent
the first Christian emperor.^ His writings have frequently
been classed with those of the Latin fathers of the church.'^

The significance of this legendary growth is twofold. In
the first place it plainly served as a sedative for uneasiness
over the entrance of such a potent personage as the emperor
into the affairs of the church. Over against the pagan
world there could be only jubilation over the possession of
such a powerful patron. Over against objectionable Chris-
tians, too, the Catholic clergy were glad to have the lever-
age of imperial favor, and the disposal of public funds to
the exclusion of schismatics. But in the theological con-
troversies of the early third century even the Catholic
church and clergy suffered from the access to the emperors
ear enjoyed by their enemies; thence the consciousness, not
often expressed, that there were disadvantages attached to
an imperial protector. There are two remarkable passages
in Eusebius' Life of Constantine which seem strangely out
of place in the midst of his extravagant eulogy. In the
first * he merely says that owing to the emperor's good
nature and lack of discrimination offenses went unpunished,

* Churrh History, i, 2.

' See Richardson's bibliography on Constantine in Nicene and Post
Nuene Fathers, Second Series, Eusebius, vol. i, p. 456 ff., under
Arbellot, Audiat, Berthele and Musset.

' So Migne, who gives them in his P. L., vol. viii.

* iv, 31.

145]

EARLY LEGENDS

145

and this state of things drew with it no small blame on
the general administration of the empire; whether justly
or not, let everyone form his own judgment; for myself
I only ask permission to record the fact." In the second,
he breaks through his self-imposed reserve,^ and writes
bitterly, In truth I can myself bear testimony to the griev-
ous evils which prevailed during these times; I mean the
violence of rapacious and unprincipled men, who preyed on
all classes of society alike, and the scandalous hypocrisy of
those who crept into the Church, and assumed the name and
character of Christians. His own benevolence and good-
ness of heart, the genuineness of his own faith, and his
truthfulness of character, induced the emperor to credit
the profession of these reputed Christians, who craftily pre-
served the semblance of sincere affection for his person.
The confidence he reposed in such men sometimes forced
him into conduct unworthy of himself, of which envy took
advantage to cloud in this respect the luster of his character.
These offenders, however, were soon overtaken by divine
chastisement." ^ The only consolation for the evils of im-
perial control lay in the thought of the Christian disposi-
tion of the ruler, and in the hope of divine chastisement of
evil advisers. Theodoret, a staunch Athanasian, also felt
called upon to explain how Constantine had been deceived
by malicious and designing bishops and had " sent so many
great men into exile." ^ He compared him to David, re-
ceived by Ziba, and ends with the sigh " However, the em-
peror w-as translated from his earthly dominion to a better
kingdom."

' iv, 54-55.

^ This, it seems to me, refers to episodes in the church such as the
case of Eustathius at Antioch, or some phase of the Arian controversy,
rather than to any graft in civil affairs, v^^ith which Eusebius does not
concern himself at all in the Life of Constantine.

' i. 33-

146 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [146

In the second place the glorification of Constantine as an
ideal Christian witnesses the acceptance by the church of
the transformation which, beginning earlier and continu-
ing later, proceeded most rapidly in this generation. I refer
to the transformation of the church into a rigidly organized,
dogmatically defined organization linked to the state. Con-
stantine as emperor was a powerful factor in this process.
He and his successors, as emperors and under the aegis of
his legendary sainthood, occupied a place in the church to
which as mere individuals they were not entitled. Constan-
tine, it will be remembered, was not baptized and did not
even become a catechumen, until his last illness overtook
him. Yet he sat with bishops in council, and directed
the church in important matters. In this the church made
a sacrifice of its independence from which, in the East,
especially, it never recovered. There the emperor retamed
a place in the church corresponding somewhat with that
which he had held in paganism as pontifex maxirniis. Ac-
cording to the story which Theodoret relates of the disci-
pline imposed by Ambrose upon Theodosius the Great for
the massacre at Thessalonica, it had been the custom at
Constantinople before that episode for the emperor to re-
main with the priests inside the altar-rail after presenting
his gift at the communion table. It reinained for Ambrose
to teach him the distinction made between clergy and laHy
in the West: " The priests alone, O emperor, are permitted
to enter within the railing of the altar, others must not ap-
proach it. Retire then, and remain with the rest of the
laity. A purple robe makes emperors, but not priests." ^
It is well known that the church as a whole rose to Am-
brose's position and in the Middle Ages no longer stood in
awe of emperors, and. that the papacy rather delighted to

^ Theodoret, v, 18.

I^^] EARLY LEGENDS I47

teach them humihty, but the joy of imperial recognition
was probably too fresh and too great in the time of Con-
stantine for church officials to fully appreciate the distinc-
tion between temporal and spiritual power. Instead, it for-
got the darker side of the emperor's life; it extolled his
piety and his favor with God and elaborated these themes
in eulogy and in legend.

4. Legends of Church Building
One token of Constantine's devotion to the church was
especially magnified by tradition. In another connection a
list has been given of the church buildings whose erection
may with some assurance be assigned to Constantine or his
family.^ With the facts of Constantine's munificence in
church building, and the fact of his being the first Christian
emperor, as a suggestion to the imagination of subsequent
generations, legends of buildings erected by him sprang
up on every hand. Local pride attributed edifices by the
hundred to him, with which he had no connection what-
ever.^

When buildings actually erected by him, or those con-
nected with him, were either destroyed or rebuilt, as all of
them sooner or later were with the exception of the Senate's
triumphal arch to him, the unmarked site or the later
structure was still permanently connected with him.

The Liher Pontificalis gives under the life of Sylvester
an illustration of the legendary process. Here an enormous
list is given of Constantine's benefactions to the various
Roman churches. But almost no benefactions by emper-
ors, or others, of later generations are reported under the
lives of subsequent popes. A study of the list, and com-
parison with other parts of the Liher Pontificalis shows that

1 Cf. supra, pp. 57-61.

' Cf. Lethaby in Cambridge Medieval History, i, pp. 609-611.

148

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[148

the author or authors conveniently bunched documentary
and other information about subsequent donations under the
name of the first Christian emperor and his assumed spir-
itual father. These were glorified at the expense of the
fame of those who came after them. Undoubtedly the
same process took place with reference to many buildings.^

5. Legends of the Founding of Constantinople ^
A most curious illustration of the work of the legend-
building imagination is afforded by the fanciful way in
which the story of Constantine's piety became interwoven
with almost every great deed of his. Among the many
successes of Constantine one of the most notable was the
new city which he built on the site of the ancient Byzan-
tium. With characteristic ambition and energy he made it
a monument such as no other Roman emperor ever left. A
memorial of his victory over Licinius, on the edge of the
recruiting fields of the hardiest soldiers of the Roman army,
Thrace, Macedonia, Illyrica and Dalmatia, the location was
so admirable that this new Rome, as the Emperor named
it,^ became the greatest city of the empire and the last sur-
viving seat of its power. It was called Constantinople
within the lifetime of its founder.*

^ Gregorovius, City of Rome, i, p. 40 n.; ii, p. 161.

Curious mistakes of identity were also made; the equestrian statue
of Marcus Aurelius at Rome was called Constantine the Great through-
out the Middle Ages.

^ J. Maurice, Les Origines de Constantinople. Memoires du centen-
aire des antiqiiaires de France (1904), pp. 284 et seq., is one of the
best recent works on the historical facts involved.

3 Augustine, City of God, v, 25 ; Sozomen, ii, 2-3 ; cf. Ducange, Con-
stantinopolis Christiana, i, 6.

^ Panegyr. Optatiamis Porphyrins, 4, 6; 18, 33 ; Eusebius, Life of
Constantine, iv, 58; Eutropius, x, 8; Julian, Orations, i, p. 8; Bordeaux
Pilgrim, in Migne, P. L., viii, col. 783 et seq., cf. Ducange, op. cit., i,
5. This name was doubtless used with the emperor's approval, and per-
haps by his order, cf. Sozomen, loc. cit., Socrates, i, 16.

149]

EARLY LEGENDS

149

Aside from legends exaggerating the magnificence of the
new city and the desolation of Rome, stript to people and
adorn it/ stories of providential omens developed about it.
A law of Constantine's granting special favors to Constan-
tinople declares the divine origin of its name.^ The site
also, was later said to have been indicated to the emperor by
God. Sozomen tells how Constantino, resolved upon found-
ing a city which should be called by his own name,

repaired to a plain at the foot of Troy, near the Hellespont,
above the tomb of Ajax, where, it is said, the Achaians in-
trenched themselves when besieging Troy ; and here he laid the
plan of a large and beautiful city, and built the gates on an
elevated spot of ground, whence they are still visible from the
sea to mariners. But when he had advanced thus far, God
appeared to him by night, and commanded him to seek an-
other site for his city. Led by the hand of God, he arrived at
Byzantium in Thrace, beyond Chalcedon in Bithynia, and here
he was desired to build his city, and to render it worthy of the
name of Constantine. In obedience to the command of God,
he therefore enlarged the city, etc.^

1 Cf. Gibbon, Decline and Fall, etc., ed. Bury, ii, p. 151 et seq., and
references given there.

^ " Pro commoditate urbis, quam aeterno nomine jubente deo dona-
vimus, haec vobis privilegea credidimus deferenda," etc. Cod. Theod.,
xiii, 5, 7, Dec. i, 334-

' ii, 3. Seeck accepts this as historical, and calls the night revelation
a dream. He holds it to be confirmed by Cod. Theod., xiii, 5, 7, " pro
commoditate urbis, quam aeterno nomine jubente deo donavimus," but
it will be noticed that this claims divine sanction for the name, not the
site, of the city. I am inclined to look upon the whole story as an in-
stance of the prevalent tendency to assume supernatural guidance for
an accomplished fact. It is of a piece with Sozomen's explanation of
the continued prosperity of the city begun; "by the assistance of God,
it became the most populous and wealthy of cities. I know of no cause
to account for this extraordinary aggrandizement, unless it be the piety
of the builder and of the inhabitants, and their compassion and liber-
ality toward the poor." This of Constantinople!

Burckhardt, on the other hand, cites vague reports that Constantine

150 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [ic^q

The story of divine guidance extended to the details of the
laying out the city. Philostorgius ^ says "that when he went
to mark the circuit of the city, he walked around it with a
spear in his hand; and when his attendants thought he was
measuring out too large a space, one of them came up to
him and asked him, ' How far, O prince ? ' The emperor
answered, ' Until he who goes before me comes to a stop ' ;
by this answer clearly manifesting that some heavenly
power was leading him on, and teaching him what to do."

Long afterwards, in the West, the heavenly guidance
was represented as coming in a very different and more
romantic way. Bishop Aldhelm ^ recites that when Con-
stantine was in Byzantium once on a time, he had the fol-
lowing dream. A feeble old woman appeared to him in his
sleep, and, at the command of Sylvester, bishop of Rome,

thought of making Sardica (now Sofia, Bulgaria), Thessalonica and
Chalcedon his new capital. (Zeit Constantins, p. 436.) He also, in his
effort to show that Constantine was not a Christian, argues that he
allowed the establishment of pagan cults in New Rome, and that the
eternal name which he gave the city was that of Flora, Anthusa, or
some other pagan deity. (Op. cit., pp. 440, 441, 382 et passim.) This
is altogether unhistorical.

^ ii, 9.

2 About 690 A. D., in the Liber de Laudibus Virginitatis, in his Opera,
ed. Giles, pp. 27 et seq., 151 et seq., in Migne, P. L., Ixxix. Friedrich,
ConstantiniscJie Schcnkung, pp. 137-138, thinks the narrative is an inven-
tion added to the Vita Silvestri with an object, namely, to exalt Sylves-
ter and the Roman Church of which he was bishop, by having him give
directions about the founding of Constantinople. England was the
great ultramontane center of that time, and Friedrich's theory is plaus-
ible. Aldhelm gives it as one of a series of stories about Sylvester, evi-
dently taken from a copy of the Vita. It is said to be in some MS.
copies of this work. Nevertheless one is not certain that it is not
merely the product of a fanciful imagination inserted in the Vita Sil-
vestri after it had developed in England or elsewhere. Constantine's
connection with their country was not forgotten by medieval English-
men ; they made a national hero out of him, and his legendary memory
blossomed more grotesquely there than elsewhere. Cf. supra, p. 120.

I^l] EARLY LEGENDS 151

he engaged in prayer. The old woman changed into a beau-
tiful maiden. Constantine covered her with his mantle
and put his diadem on her head. His mother Helena said
to him She will belong to you and will never die." When
he awoke from this dream Constantine was perplexed and
sought its solution in a week's fast. Sylvester then ap-
peared again to him in a dream and told him that the old
woman was the city of Byzantium in which he then was,
old and almost in ruins. But Constantine was to mount
the horse on which at Rome in his baptismal robes he had
ridden to the graves of the Apostles, and take the labarum
w^ith the sign of Christ in his right hand. He was then to
let the horse take its way and to drag the shaft of the spear
along the ground so as to make a furrow. Along this the
walls of the new city were to be built, which was to bear
his name, and to be the queen of all cities. Here his de-
scendants would reign forever. As soon as Constantine
awoke he went to work as directed. This version of the
founding of Constantinople is repeated with variations by
William of Malmesbury, by Ralph de Diceto and others,
and passed into general literature.^

1 Cf. Richardson in Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers, Eusebius, p.
443. Legends about Constantine and the founding of Constantinople
abound throughout the Balkan Peninsula. Cf. Heydenreich, " Con-
stantin der Grosse in den Sagen des Mittelalters," Deutsch. Zeitsch. f.
Geschichtewissenschaft, ix (1893). Cf. also, art. "Roumania" (Liter-
ature) in Encyclopedia Britannica.

CHAPTER V

LATER LEGENDS OF CONSTANTINE's CONVERSION AND
BAPTISM

I. Legends of Constantine's Conversion by Helena; of his
Baptism by Eiisebiiis of Rome

The early, Eusebian legend of Constantine's conversion
through a miraculous vision, as we have seen, long had
only a limited scope. Various other legends sprang up in
different places. One, embodied in apocryphal letters,
ascribed his conversion to the influence of his mother,
Helena, thus exactly reversing the more probable account
which Eusebius gives of the religious relationship of the
two persons.^ Theodoret may have ascribed to her a part
in the emperor's spiritual rebirth in a reference he makes
to her as most highly blessed in her maternal capacity,
having been the means of producing that great light which
she still nourished by religious counsels." '

In the main version of the legend of the finding of the
true cross in the reign of Constantine, the emperor is said
to have been instructed in the Christian faith and baptized
by Eusebius, bishop of Rome (309 or 310).^ In the earlier

* Life of Constantine, iii, 47.

' i, 18. Elsewhere, however, he says Constantine " like the divine
apostle, was not called by man, nor through man, but by God," i, 2.
This must refer to his miraculous conversion. It is possible that the
allusion in i, 18, is merely to the fact that Helena gave birth to Con-
stantine.

3 For this legend cf. supra, pp. 116-119.

152 [152

153]

LATER LEGENDS OF CONVERSION

153

and more fragmentary allusions to the finding of the cross,
such as those of Ambrose and Rufinus, this is not included,
and after the eleventh century, but apparently never before
then, the name of Sylvester (314-336) is sometimes substi-
tuted for that of his predecessor ^ the change being evidently
a late correction. The baptism by Eusebius of Rome may
have been invented originally as an orthodox correction for
the historical baptism by Eusebius of Nicomedia, the Arian,
made easily and perhaps ignorantly ; and furthered perhaps
by the fact that Eusebius of Nicomedia, during the last
four years of his life, was bishop of Constantinople, the
" capital " of the East as Rome was the capital " of the
West^ In other writings which refer to- Constantine's
baptism, the name of the priest who administered it is often
omitted. It will be remembered that the name is not given
in the account of Eusebius of Caesarea.^ Some subsequent
writers, either through ignorance, or from theological mo-
tives, also give no name. Gelasius of Cyzicus, bishop of
Caesarea in Palestine (c. 475) merely affirms that Constan-
tine was assuredly baptized, not by a heretic, but by an
orthodox priest.*

2. Earliest Version of Constantine's Leprosy

When pious story tellers of the fifth and sixth centuries,
who knew none of the historical facts of Constantine's bap-
tism, turned their attention to his conversion they produced

^ J. B. Aufhauser, Konstantins Kreusesvision, p. 20, in Ausgew'dhlte
Texte. Cf. also the Inventio sanctae criccis, ed. from Cod. Paris, lat.
2769 (6th or 7th cent.) by A. Holder (Leipsic, 1889), p. 2.

2 Dolger developes this point at length in "Die Taufe Konstantins u.
i., Problems," in Konstantin d. G. u. s. Zeit., pp. 417-422.

3 Cf. supra, p. 87 et seq.

*■ Preserved in Photius, Bihliotheca Cod., Ixxxix, Migne, P. G., vol.
103, col. 293 ; given also in t)61ger, op. cit., p. 395, n. 2.

154 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [154

most extraordinary narratives. The oldest of these which
has been preserved is contained in a homily upon the bap-
tism of Constantine from James of Sarug, in Mesopotamia
(452-521 A. D.), a monophysite bishop who wrote in
Syriac/ This is his version: Constantine from birth had
a leprosy upon his forehead and lips, which no physicians
could heal. After his succession to the throne he sent for
" Chaldeans " from Babylon. These advised him to bathe
in the blood of freshly-slain infants. The infants were
collected, but the chief of the slaves and the mothers tried
to prevent the death of the children. The chief of the
slaves urged that Constantine would be cured by baptism,
and cited him an instance of its miraculous effect. Through
the appearance of an angel the advice of the slave carried
the day. He ran to the church and asked the bishop to pre-
pare for the baptism of the emperor. The bishop called his
priests and they met the emperor, who came from his palace
with his splendid retinue. The bishop first annointed Con-
stantine with oil, that he might be cleansed, and that the
leprosy might not defile the holy water. The leprosy fell
from him; he praised God, and descended with the priest
into the water. He was deterred from baptism, however,
by a flame which burned above the water, until his crown
was removed. Then, as a simple believer, he was baptized,
and afterwards he partook of the eucharist

It is improbable that James of Sarug manufactured the
whole of his interesting narrative. Judging from the use he
makes of it as a homily, it must have been in more or less
general circulation in his part of the world. It has been
shown by Duchesne ^ that such a version of Constantine's

^ A. L. Frothingham, Jr., L'omelia di Giacomo di Sarug sul hattesimo
di Costantino imperator, publicata, tradotta ed annotato, first published
in Memorie della Accademia dei Lincei, viii, 1882 (Rome, 1883). Froth-
ingham thinks the homily was pronounced some time after 473.

* Liber Pontiiicalis, vol. i, p. cxvii et seq.

155]

LATER LEGENDS OF CONVERSION

baptism could scarcely have originated in Byzantine or
Egyptian sources, and that it must probably have developed
in the region of Armenia and Syria.

3. Armenian Version

We meet this legend, later, in the History of Armenia'
which bears the name of Moses of Chorene (d. 489). This
work is in reality a miscellany from various sources, and
while it may have as its base a genuine writing of Mosea
of Chorene,^ in its present form it can not date from earlier
than the seventh or eighth century." Its story of Constan-
tine's conversion runs thus: Constantine, while still only a
Caesar, turned defeat into victory by putting a cross upon
his banners as had been suggested to him in a dream. Later,
however, induced by his wife, Maximina, daughter of Dio-
cletian, he persecuted the Christians and was therefore
smitten with leprosy. Physicians and sorcerers, even one
sent by Trdat, king of Armenia, did him no good. A priest
commanded a bath in infants' blood, but at the last moment
Constantine shrank from the execution of the children. As a
reward for his tenderheartedness, he was, in a dream, com-
manded by the apostle to seek healing in baptism at the
hands of Sylvester, bishop of Rome, then in hiding from
persecution at Mt. Soracte. He did so, and received in-

^ So F. N. Fink, Die Litteraturen des Ostens, Band vii, Abt. 2, p. 92.
(Leipsic, 1907.)

^ Cf. A. Carriere, Nouvelles sources de Moise de Khoren, Vienne,
1893; Supplement, Vienne, 1894; A. v. Gutschmid, Moses von Chorene,
in Kleine Schriften, iii; Paul Vetter, in Literarische Rundschau, 1893,
p. 264, and Theologische Quartalschrift, 1894, p. 49; H. Gelzer, in
Realencyclop'ddie fur prot. Theologie ; O. Bardenhewer, Patrologie
(1910), p. 514-

Duchesne and others, on the basis of the older studies of Armenian
literature, considered the version which Moses of Chorene gave as
the oldest form of the legend of Constantine's baptism by Sylvester at
Rome, and dated it about the middle of the fifth century. This theory
must be rejected in the light of the more recent works referred to.

156 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [156

struction and baptism, became sound, and continued victor-
ious over his enemies.

This version of the legend includes various points incor-
porated from sources outside of Armenia and Syria, such
as the adoption of the cross for use in battle owing to a
vision in a dream, and some items which were apparently
present only in versions quite a little later than the time of
Moses of Chorene, such as the use of the name of Sylvester,
bishop of Rome. But while it shows familiarity with the
later Sylvester legend, and has other foreign additions, it
may well represent a story current in Armenia long before
the seventh century, current possibly in the days of the real
Moses of Chorene.

There were also antecedents in earlier Syrian and
Armenian stories for legends of royal leprosy and its
cure by conversion.^ The legend of Abgar, king of
Edessa, cured and converted by Addai (Thaddeus) in
the time of the apostles, was well known throughout the
east before the fourth century. It had many points of
resemblance with the legends of Constantine's conver-
sion as told by James and by Moses above, and as ex-
panded later,^ such as the affliction of leprosy, conversion
accompanied with healing, conversion of nobles and peo-

^This sort of story is, of course, confined to no particular country.
Conversions through miraculous cures are found among most peoples in
all ages. One of the most remarkable legendary cases is that of the
emperor Tiberius in a Latin document, dated by its translators in the
seventh or eighth century, which combines the stories of St. Veronica
and of Nathan's embassy. Here it is said, " Tiberius was ill, and full
of ulcers and fevers, and had nine kinds of leprosy." Fortunately,
when " he adored the image of the Lord," he was healed. Cf. Ante-
Nicene Fathers, vol. viii (New York, 1903), pp. 472-76. Leprosy was
then, even more than now more common in the East than in the West,
but too much stress can not be laid on this, as the Scriptures may have
suggested the type of disease by the stories of Naaman and others.

"^Cf. infra, p. 161 et seq..

1^7] LATER LEGENDS OF CONVERSION 157

pie following that of the king, exhibition of a p^'cture
(in the case of Abgar, the picture of Jesus), mention of
the king's mother, hostility toward the Jews, and the
statement of the king that no one would be compelled
to become a Christian.'

In Armenia, the reign of Trdat (Tiridates), a con-
temporary of Constantine, was a time of glorious national
revival. The Roman government then, and for some
time after, supported the Armenian kingdom against the
Persians, and the country had a breathing spell before
its final political dismemberment. This was also the
time of Gregory the Illuminator, the national saint, to
whom was assigned credit for the conversion, first of the
king and ultimately of the people, to Christianity.
Trdat and Gregory probably visited Constantine and
made an alliance with him.^ Caesarea, in Palestine, the
seat of Eusebius the historian, became later the center to
which "nascent Armenian Christianity" was bound "in
the closest ties of intimacy." ^ It was only natural that
the rich growth of legends about Trdat and Gregory
should include Constantine in its scope. From the
Armenian point of view the conversion of Constantine
would be the central fact in his career and in the history
of the Roman Empire of that time. One of the legends
about the Armenian king ran to the effect that he perse-
cuted the Christians, was transformed into a mere dumb
animal, and was restored and converted by Gregory.

' Cf. Eusebius: Church History, i, 13, also Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol.
vii, p. 704. The full legend is given in The Doctrine of Addai,"
Syrian text and English translation by George Phillips, 1896. Phillips
accepts the legend as having an historical basis, impossible passages
being interpolations.

'The copy of the treaty, however, printed in Migne, P. L., viii, 579
— 582 is spurious.

^ Baynes, in Eng. Hist. Rev., xxv, p. 626 et seq.

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[158

Other portions of the two legends, moreover, show
similarity. It is therefore plausible that Armenians or
neighboring Syrians of the fifth century should have
imagined Constantine to have been healed of his disease
and converted by the bishop of his capital city/

4. Connection of the Legend with Ro77ie and Sylvester

Among the differences noted between the legend told
by James of Sarug and that given in Moses of Chorene
was the fact that the former left all the actors, with the
sole exception of Constantine, anonymous, while the
latter specifically named Sylvester, bishop of Rome, as
the one who instructed and baptized the emperor. This,
and some other differences, are to be accounted for, I
think, by the process, common to the growth of most
legends, of rounding out and completing legendary de-
tails as the story goes from mouth to mouth. The
date of the final redaction of Moses of Chorene's history
makes it possible that the particulars referred to may

^The most reliable early Armenian historian of the fourth century is
now held to be Faustus of Byzantium. (French trans, in Langlois;
Coll. d. hist. Arm., i. 201-310. German trans, by H. Gelzer). He
confirms the existence of close relationshipbetween the Roman Em.pire
and Armenia. For discussion of Armenian historians, see Gelzer:
"Die Anfange der Armenischen Kirche," in Berichte u. die Verhand.
d. kon. sdchsischen Gesellschaft d. Wissenschaft, Phil. hist. Klasse, xlvii,
{1895) 109-174. Cf. also Bury ed. Gibbon, Decline and Fall, etc., ii,
PP- .'563-565; and Baynes, " Rome and Armenia in the Fourth Cen-
tury," Eng. Hist. Rev., xxv (1910), pp. 625-643.

Duchesne contended strongly for the Armenian or Syrian source of
the legend, and though at points his arguments are not now conclusive,
I believe that his main proposition, while by no means absolutely
proven, is the best solution of the question.

Dolger, in Constantin d. Grosse u. s. Zeit, pp. 406-407, et passim,
is unwilling to accept this theory as proven, and attempts to prove the
Roman origin of at least many of the elements of the story. Cf. inffa,
p. 159.

ic^g-j LATER LEGENDS OF CONVERSION j^g

have been incorporated in it from some copy of the
Vt^a Silvestri described below. On the other hand, it
is entirely possible that these statements originated in
Armenia or Syria and that Moses of Chorene represents
the line by which they entered into the Vita Silvestri.
In either case the process was probably essentially the
same. But why was the baptism located at Rome, and
the priest who administered it identified with Sylvester?

One answer to this question attributes the develop-
ment, if not the origin of the legend itself, to Rome.
Dolger thinks that Eusebius of Nicomedia, who really
baptized the emperor, becoming later bishop of Con-
stantinople, was vaguely spoken of as performing the
rite at New Rome, or the capital city. In the West,
this phrase suggested Rome, and, as there was a Euse-
bius who was bishop of Rome in Constantine's time, the
Roman Eusebius was substituted for the other, and the
legend in this form proved satisfactory.^ Later, when it
became justly recognized that the pontificate of Euse-
bius came too early to admit of his having converted
Constantine, Sylvester, his second successor, was put in
his place. The legend of the finding of the true cross,
in one form of which Constantine is said to have been
instructed and baptized by Eusebius of Rome, is cited as
at once the proof of this theory and perhaps the vehicle
by which the change was made.^

The latter legend, however, did not contain a state-
ment of the Roman baptism in its earliest forms, ^ prob-
ably not till after the legend of Constantine's leprosy and

^This position lends itself to the support of the theory that the legend
of the Roman baptism arose in the West, and possibly at Rome; a theory
which seems to me untenable.

' Op. cit.y 416-422.

^ Eg. in Ambrose and Rufinus, cf. supra, p. 119.

l6o CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [i6o

cure had come into existence. Moreover, if as we have
seen/ in the story of the finding of the cross, Eusebius
continued to hold the place of honor until the eleventh
century, this legend surely cannot be construed as ex-
plaining the belief that Sylvester converted Constantine.
Nor can the fact that a baptistery connected with the
Lateran church at Rome which Constantine erected was
later spoken of as the place of his baptism explain the
Sylvester legend, for this identification of the place of
the act, also, developed too late. No direct evidence,
and no important indirect evidence of this legendary
identification can be adduced, earlier than the statement
in the Liber Pontificalis of Constantine's leprosy, baptism
and cure by Sylvester, which at the earliest, would not
take us back beyond the year five hundred and thirty.^
It was in any case an absurdity to represent Constan-
tine as being baptized in a building which he had erected
in gratitude for the cure effected in his baptism. Legend-
makers, however, starting with the supposition that he
had been baptized at Rome, might easily overlook the
inconsistency of this identification of the spot, or, as
they probably thought of it, of the baptismal font ; but
to start with the identification of the building and then
develop this legend about it would have been too severe
a tax upon the imagination. ^

The locating of the baptism at Rome, therefore, and
the connecting of Sylvester with it, can best be explained,
if at all, on general considerations. Rome was the an-
cient and most famous capital of the empire, and Sylves-
ter was bishop there during most of Constantine's reign
{i. e., 314-336); thus the location of the rite at Rome

^ Cf. supra, p. 153.

* Cf. ed. Duchesne, vol. i, pp. 78, 172-174.
^ Cf. infra, pp. 161-165 et seq.

l6i] LATER LEGENDS OF CONVERSION i6i

and its connection with Sylvester, whether effected in
the West, or as seems more probable, in the East, was
inevitable.

Thus Constantine's conversion entered into the stream
of one of the most extraordinary legendary develop-
ments in the church, that centering in Pope Sylvester
and preserved in the Vita Silvestri.^

5. Vita Silvestri.
The best known version of the Vita (or Gesta) Sil-
vestri is the Latin one given by Mombritius.^ The fol-
lowing synopsis is based chiefly on his account :

^ The chief apocryphal or legendary account of Sylvester is a long
and fairly well defined story variously referred to as Liber Silvestri,
Vita Silvestri, or Gesta Silvestri, not to be confused with the " vita" or
gesta Silvestri in the Liber Poniiticalis, though this refers to incidents
in the story and evidently accepts it.

The legend has been preserved in three languages, as follows: Latin,
Mombritius, Sanctuarium, sive Vitae collectae ex codibus MSS. (Milan,
about 1479, and in a recent edition in Paris in 1910) vol. ii, folio 279
etseq.,z.ndi ii, 508-531, respectively. Cf. 2l\so Analecta Bollandiana,
vol. i, p. 613 et seg., by P. Ch de Smedt. Cf. also Caialogus Cod.
hagiographicorum bibl. reg. Bruxellensis, pp. 5, 119; L. Surius, De
probatis sanctorum vitis (Coloniae Agrippinae, 1618), in volume on
December, Dec. 31, pp. 368-375, a translation from the Greek of Simeon
Metaphrastes. Greek, Combefis: Illustrium Christi martyrum triumphi
Paris, 1659), p. 254 et seg., from MS. Mazarinaeus, No. 513, Bibli-
otheque Nationale. Another Greek text is in MS. Cod., Paris, 1448,
folio I. Syriac: Land, Anedocta syriaca, vol. iii, pp. 46-76, from MS.
Brit. Mus. Add., 17202, of the sixth or seventh century. Another
version in MS. 12174, Brit. Mus. Cf. Duchesne: op. cit., i, cix.
Later repetitions of the legend in Byzantine authors are: Ephraem (in
the 14th century), ed. Bekker (Bonn, 1840), pp. 21-25; ed. Migne, P.
G., vol. 143, cols. 1-380. Cedrenus: Compendium of History, ed.
Bekker (Bonn, 1838-9), vol. i, pp. 472-520; ed. Migne, P. G., vols.
121-122. Zonaras: Chronicle ^ ed. Migne, P. G., vol. 134, cols. 1097-
II 18. Glycas: Chronicle, ed. Bekker (Bonn, 1836), pp. 460-468, ed.
Migne, P. G., vol. 158, cols. 1-958. For a short summary of Glycas'
version, see Richardson's " Prolegomena," in Nicene and Post Nicene
Fathers, Eusebius, p. 442, and for comments on the other authors, pp.
453-454.

■■^ See Duchesne: Liber Pontificalis, i, pp. cx, cxii, cxiii. Synopsis

l62 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [162

A dedicatory letter says the accompanying life of Syl-
vester was taken from the Acts of the bishops of the
principal sees which, together with many Acts of mar-
tyrs, were written by Eusebins of Caesarea but not in-
cluded in his Church History.^ Sylvester, a young
Roman, entertained Timothy of Antioch fleeing from
persecution. Timothy, however, was executed and Syl-
vester threatened with death, which he escaped by a
miracle. Bishop Miltiades (or Melchiades) raised him
to the priesthood, and at the death of that bishop, Syl-
vester, against his own will, was made his successor.
After a long description of his administration, a visit of
Euphronius from Antioch to Rome is narrated, at whose
advice Sylvester changes the garb of his higher clergy,
calls the days of the week by numerals instead of names,
and makes Sundays and Thursdays festival days, with
Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays fast days. Next,
Sylvester frees Rome from a dragon dwelling under the
Tarpeian rock. (This episode is omitted by Mombritius).

Then begins the legend of Constantine's conversion.
At the instance of his wife, Maximiana, daughter of
Diocletian (a gross historical error), Constantine begins
a persecution from which Sylvester took refuge in Mt.
Syraptim (probably an imaginary name, but afterwards
identified with Soracte). The emperor is afflicted with
leprosy, to cure which pagan priests order a bath in the
blood of infants. Infants are collected for the purpose,
but Constantine relents and sends them home. In the

given here is, in part, taken from this work, vol. i, p. cx, et seq. For
a short summary in English, see Hodgkin: Italy and her Invaders, v'n,
p. 135 et seq.

^The version published bySurius (p. 368) does not connect Eusebius'
name with the story, leaving it anonymous. Cf. Friedrich: Constan-
iinische Schenkung, pp. 79-81.

163] LATER LEGENDS OF CONVERSION 163

night Saints Peter and Paul appear to him, promising in
reward for this, healing from his disease if he will seek
out Sylvester and do as he says. In the presence of the
emperor Sylvester shows likenesses of Peter and Paul,
who are identified by Constantine as the persons v^ho
appeared to him. Then follows Christian instruction, a
solemn fast, and baptism of the emperor in the baths of
the Lateran palace. As Constantine enters the water, a
bright light is seen, and he is healed.

Constantine then directs that Christ be worshipped
everywhere, that blasphemy be punished, and that
churches be built with public money. There is, how-
ever, to be no new church organized without sanction
from the bishop of Rome, and all other -bishops are to
be subject to him. The eighth day after his baptism
Constantine commenced the building of the basilica of a
church of St. Peter ; the next day he began to build a
church in the Lateran palace, and issued edicts for the
conversion of pagans. The Senate still remaining pagan,
Constantine called an assembly in the Ulpian Basilica, at
which he urged conversion on the strength of his ex-
perience, but says he will not compel men to change.

Helena, then living in Bithynia with her grandchildren,
writes approving Constantine's renunciation of paganism,
but urging him to adopt Judaism. The matter is de-
cided on August 13, 315 (die iduum aug. Constantino
Aug. IV et Licinio Aug. IV cons.) by a disputation be-
fore Constantine and Helena at Rome between Sylvester
and twelve Jewish rabbis. The pope successfully up-
holds the doctrine of the trinity and the incarnation
(stating the latter so as to exclude monothelitism so
thoroughly that some have detected a trace of Nestorian-
ism). The rabbis then show the power of their religion
by whispering the name of Jehovah into the ear of a bull,

164

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[104

killing him instantly, to the astonishment of all. Syl-
vester, however, raises the bull from the dead by whisper-
ing the name of Christ. Helena and great multitudes
with her are thereby converted to Christianity.

The Latin versions of the legend end with two episodes,
the miraculous founding of Constantinople, and the find-
ing of the true cross, which are not found in the Greek
versions.^

6. Development of the Sylvester -Constantine Legend

To understand the history of this legend it is neces-
sary to distinguish between the legend itself e. the
bare story that Constantine was a persecutor afflicted
with leprosy, and was converted, baptized and cured
through the agency of Sylvester at Rome) and differ-
ences of detail or variations in the different written
versions. The legend, in its bare outlines, as we have
seen, probably originated, not at Rom.e, but on the out-
skirts of the Empire, among people familiar only with
the great names and events of Roman history. Aside
from considerations already mentioned, the scarcity and
confusion of the topographical references it contains, its
slow growth in popularity at Rome, and the stress it
lays upon the visit and advice of Timotheus, indicate a
foreign, probably an Eastern source, and possibly a
source as far east as Syria and Armenia.

^ The best discussions of this Sylvester legend are: Dollinger, Papst-
fabeln des Mitielalters, 1863, ed. by Friedrich with notes, 1890. (Bol-
linger's further work on the legend was left unfinished at his death;.
Frothingham, ed. Homily on the Baptism of Constantine, (L'Omelia
di Giacomo di Sarug) in Memorie delta r. Accademia dei Lincei, classe
di scienze morale, vol. viii, 1883). J. Langen, Geschichte d. rom.
Kirche (1885), ii, p. 195 et seq. Abbe Duchesne, ed. Liber Fontijicalis,
vol. i (1886), pp. cvii-cxx. F. J. Dolger, " Die Taufe Konstantins u. i.
Probleme," in Konstantin d. Grosse u. s. Zeit (1913), pp. 377-381,
394-426. Friedrich, Die Co7istantinische Schenkung, Nordlingen, 1889.

165] LATER LEGENDS OF CONVERSION 165

At Rome itself this legend first comes to light in refer-
ences to books containing it, in the time of Pope Sym-
machus (498-514). There is no record in VN^riters, his-
torians, poets, orators, official documents, liturgies or
inscriptions, of any local Roman tradition connected with
the legend until the eighth century. In fact, there is
no trace of the legend in extant inscriptions or monu-
ments in Rome before the tenth century.' It came into
vogue very slowly and does not seem to have prevailed
there until after it had been taken up in many other
places. These considerations show both the lack of any
historical ground whatever for the legend, and its non-
Roman source.'

However the legend of Constantine's leprosy and cure
started, it got to Rome by the end of the fifth century,
possibly earlier. Duchesne thinks it may have been put
into literary Latin by some eastern monk such as Dion-
ysius Exiguus.3 The legend and a book containing it
are referred to in the forged documents brought out by
ecclesiastical controversies centering about Symmachus
(bishop of Rome 498-514). The pseudo [?] Decretum
Gelasii P. de recipiendis et non recipiendis libris (c. A.
D. 501, Duchesne: after 533, Friedrich)^ says that the
anonymous Acts of Sylvester are read by many of the
orthodox in Rome and many churches elsewhere and
does not condemn the practice. ^ The pseudo Consti-

^ Duchesne, op. cit., i, pp. cxiii, cxvi. ""'Ibid., i, cxvi.

^Op. cit., vol. i, p. cxiii et seq.

* Cf. Mirbt, in Real Encyk. vi, 475, for the view that it was merely
revised and interpolated under Pope Hormisdas (514-523).

^ Actus beati Silvestri, apostolicae sedis praesulis, licet ejus qui con-
scripsit nomen ignoretur, a multis tamen in urbe Romana catholicis
legi cognovimus, et pro antique usu multae hoc immitantur ecclesiae,
* * * beati Pauli apostoli praecedat sententia: 'omnia probate, quod
bonum est venete.'

l66 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [i66

tutum Silvestri (about 501-508, Duchesne, op. cit., i,
cxxxiv) mentions briefly the leprosy and cure. The
pseudo Gesta Liberii, from the same time, refers to an
old work which told of Constantine's leprosy and his
cure by Silvester.'

These references show^ that there must have been in
existence at Rome by the beginning of the sixth cen-
tury, a book containing the legend of Constantine's
leprosy and baptism by Silvester, that it was not asso-
ciated with the name of any author, did not enjoy a great
vogue, for its truthfulness was questioned, and it needed
apology. It certainly must have contradicted not only
the facts of history, but current opinion as well.^

It is probable that toward the end of the sixth cen-
tury this anonymous Vita Silvestri was touched up by
an enthusiast for the primacy of Rome who saw the
opportunity it afforded. It was not made much of, so
far as we know, in the middle of the century after the
stormy days of Symmachus. But by the time of Greg-
ory the Great 3 we find a version with added details,
represented in the text published by Mombritius."^

^" Hoc cum [Liberius] legisset ex libro antique, edoctus a libro Sil-
vestri episcopi Romanorum, et quod publice praedicaret, in nomine
Jesu Christi a lepra mundatum fuisse per Silvestrum Constantium patrum
Constantius." In emphasizing the antiquity of the Liber ox Vita Silves-
tri, and commending it by affirming its use by Liberius, the forger proba-
bly gives himself away, as is pointed out by Duchesne, for in the Vita
Silvestri Liberius is unhistorically represented as already dead. The
forger, however, may have had another text of the Vita Silvestri.

^ Friedrich thinks that this form is represented by the version pub-
lished by Surius, which is also anonymous. Cf. Constayitinische Schen-
kung, p. 81. For fuller discussion of the above, see Friedrich, 70-81,
and Duchesne, op. cit., i, pp. cxiii-cxv.

^Pope, 590-604.

* Friedrich, c?jz!>. rf/., p. 81 et seq. Duchesne had, before Friedrich,
given approximately the same date, but looked upon the version in
Monbritius as the earliest extant form from which other versions were
derived.

l57] LATER LEGENDS OF CONVERSION 167

Here the whole legend of Sylvester purports to be
taken from a collection of twenty books of Acts of
martyrs and bishops of the principal sees written by
Eusebius of Caesarea. The name of Sylvester's mother
is given, the speech of Sylvester against the Jewish
rabbis has a decided turn against the monothelites, and
Constantine is made to emphasize the primacy of Rome,
while Sylvester is not represented as making the trip to
Constantinople, of which the version in Surius tells.

This version had apparently become known in the east
before the end of the sixth century, where in fact the
Vita Silvestri generally became popular, and seems even
to have displaced the original eastern form of the legend
of Constantine's conversion.'

Friedrich has discussed an interesting passage in the
correspondence of Gregory the Great, in which Eulogius,
patriarch of Constantinople, wrote to him asking for a
copy of the collection of the Acts of martyrs and bishops
written by Eusebius. Gregory replied ^ that he had not
known whether they had been collected or not, and that
he had not been able to find in his archives or in libraries
at Rome any except a few scattered Acts in one manu-
script volume. If he found any such collection as was
asked for he would send it. Friederich's interpretation
of all this is that the Vita Silvestri, worked over in the
interest of the primacy of the bishop of Rome, and vali-
dated by a preface claiming Eusebian authorship, had

^ Duchesne, op. cii., i, p. cxx. One of the Greek renderings even re-
tained the part of the preface stating that the work was translated from
the Greek into Latin, thus putting his Greek into the embarrassing
position of being a translation from the Greek. This process reminds
one of a form of the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, which wa
translated into French, then this was translated into English, and this
back into French. Cf. Macdonald's ed., p. xv.

^July, 598.

l68 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [i68

fallen into the hands of Eulogius at Alexandria. He
thereupon put Rome into an embarrassing situation by
writing for the collection of the Acts by Eusebius from
which the Vt^a Silvestri in its preface claimed to come.
Gregory, in reply, could only imply that the other Acts
were scattered and lost, and asks for time.^ Though
these inferences are in places overdrawn, the passage
certainly looks like a reference to the preface of the Vita
Silvestri, and the implications must, in the main, be
accepted.

After Gregory, the Vita Silvestri was called to the
attention of pilgrims in a Roman pilgrim book composed
under Pope Honorius (625-638). ^ The Liber Pontifi-
calis incorporated in its life of Silvester his flight to
Syraptim, the baptism of Constantine by Silvester, and
Constantine's cure from leprosy.^

A legend combining two such personages as Constan-
tine and Sylvester could hardly remain entirely stereo-
typed. The manuscripts which have come dov\^n in differ-
ent languages show considerable variation of incident.
Friedrich has argued with considerable plausibility that
the legend of the miraculous founding of Constantinople
through a dream in which Sylvester figured, came into
it not long before the end of the seventh century.
Not many generations after this a modified version of it
appeared as the Constitutum Constantini, that famous
document which containing the Donation of Constantine
was destined to play a great part in the history of Europe.

^Friedrich, op. cit., pp. 83-87.

' DoUinger, Papstfabeln, ed. Friedrich, p. 65.

'Ed. Duchesne, i, 170 et seq., ed, Mommsen, p. 47 et seq. The
former assigns the original compilation, including Sylvester's life, to a
time not later than Boniface IT (530-532). Mommsen, following
Waitz, puts the work in the beginning of the seventh century.

*C/. supra, pp. 150-151.

LATER LEGENDS OF CONVERSION

169

General Acceptance of the Sylvester- Co7istanti7ie Legend
The emergence of the legend of Constantine's Roman
baptism brought medieval writers face to face with a
question of fact, for the knowledge of the earlier ac-
counts of his baptism at Nicomedia had been preserved,
not only in the east by Eusebius and his followers, but
in the west by Ambrose, Jerome, Prosper and other
authors. The former legend w^as also contradicted by
the widely used Historia Tripartita, compiled from the
three continuators of Eusebius' Church History. Con-
fronted with this problem of historical criticism, the
middle ages followed its natural bent and accepted the
one which appealed most to its imagination and its
orthodoxy. A few writers such as Isidore (636), Fred-
egar (658), Frehulf (c. 840), Hermann the Lam.e of
Reichenau (c. 1050) and Marianus Scotus (c. 1050),
held to the older version of Constantine's baptism, in
some cases apparently not knowing the later legend, in
some cases rejecting it. The Sylvester legend, however,
won the field almost completely and in the later middle
ages was seldom disputed.' It furnished one of the
arguments at the second council of Nicea for the use of

'Dollinger in Fapsifabehi , ed. Friedrich, pp. (:S-'j2 et passim, col-
lected a long and almost exhaustive list of references in medieval writ-
ers. Duchesne: Liber Poniificalis, i, p. cxv, gives a number of refer-
ences in both Latin and Greek authors, concluding that after the
commencement of the ninth century all the Byzantine chroniclers
admit the Sylvester legend more or less completely.

In the West, at the end of the sixth century, Gregory of Tours,
Hist. Franc, ii, 31, described the baptism of Clovis; " procedit novus
Constantinus ad lavacrum, deleturus leprae veteris morbum, sorden-
tesque maculas gestorum antiquorum recenti latice deleturus." The
Anglo-Saxon bishop Aldhelm, at the end of the seventh century, is
thought to have introduced the Constantine-Sylvester legend into gen-
eral literature in his ''Liber de laudibus lirginitaiis'' chap. 25 {cf.
Friedrich: Con. Schenck., pp. 156-137). The subsequent list includes
Bede, Ado, Pope Paul I., Pope Hadrian I., Odericus Vitalis, Hugo of

I-O CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [lyo

images.' Even in modern times it was incorporated in
Baronius' AnnaW and taken seriously by Severintis
Binius, whose comments are printed as notes in Migne's
PaU^ologia}

The whole story of Constantine's leprosy, cure and
baptism gained graphical representation in a series of
ten pictures in the oratory of St. Sylvester adjoining the
church of Quattro Incoronati at Rome. These probably
date from the restoration of the oratory in the thirteenth
century, but may possibly be earlier.^ Later tradition
located the spot where Constantine and Sylvester were
supposed to have parted. ^ It even influenced geography
by identifying the Syraptis or Syraptim of the legend
with the real Soracte and changing the latter name to
the former. Here, very fittingly, a monastery of St.
Sylvester was built in the eighth century.^

The reasons for the popularity and well-nigh universal
acceptance of this incredible legend are revealed by
writers who discussed it before it had entirely displaced
the historical facts. It seemed unthinkable to them that
Constantine should have presided at the Council of

Fleury, Ratramnus, Bonizo, Martinus Polonus, all thepapal chroniclers
after the Liber Pontificalis, Nicholas I., Leo IX., collections of canon
law by Anselm, Deusdedit, Gratian (in the palea, or later insertions),
the Kaiserchronik, Konrad von Wurzburg, Wolfram von Eschenbach,
and others.

' Cf. the first Act of the Council.

^ Under A. D. 324, the date to which the Roman baptism of Con-
stantine was commonly assigned, No. 32 et seq.

^ Latin series, viii, col. 795 ei seq.

^Ci. Arch, della Societa rem. di St. patria xii (1889), p. 162. Man-
cini: Vita di Lorenzo Valla, p. 154, note.

^ Gregorovius: Rome in the Middle Ages, ii, p. 361.

* Duchesne: Op. cit., i, p. cxix. Hartmann, Italien im Mittelalter,
Band ii, Halfte ii (Gotha, 1903), p. 2^2.

I^i] LATER LEGENDS OF CONVERSION lyi

Nicea, while still unbaptized. His baptism by Eusebius
of Nicomedia, a bishop tainted with Arian heresy, seemed
either improbable, or the result of a relapse, not a nat-
ural consequence of his conversion from paganism.
Moreover, how could such a hero have postponed bap-
tism to his death-bed? The existence in Rome of a
baptistery bearing the name of Constantine helped to
localize the place of his baptism. Moreover, the miracu-
lous element, instead of being an obstacle to acceptance
of the legend, was fairly demanded by the great signifi-
cance of Constantine's conversion. The absence of early
accounts corroborating it proved only that Constantius
had tried to suppress the story of his father's leprosy.^

Men of the Middle Ages were skilled harmonizers of
discrepancies. Their treatment of this legend shows
that their business was not primarily to discover facts,
but to systematize accepted teachings. They, therefore,
after accepting the legend, easily disposed of the his-
torical Nicomedian baptism. The Gesta Lideru smoothtd
over difficulties by postulating another emperor of the
same name. Bishop Bonizo rejected the Eusebian bap-
tism as an error growing out of confusion of fact and
name, due to the belief that Bishop Eusebius of Rome
had instructed Constantine in Christianity. Ekkehard,
about I ICQ, accepted both baptisms and harmonized
them by the supposition that Constantine after his Roman
conversion had fallen into the Arian heresy which led to
his having the rite repeated by Eusebius of Nicomedia.
This happy device seems to have been generally fol-
lowed. The problem was then, from all points of view,
solved to the satisfaction of the medieval mind, and the
wonderful legend of Sylvester's relations to Constantine

' So Severinus Binius. Cf. Migne, op. ciL, col. 800.

1-2 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [172

had clear sailing. It still forms a part of the Roman
Breviary^ to be read on Sylvester's Day, the last day of
the calendar year.'

So the piety of the early Middle Ages found one of its
most characteristic utterances. The wonder-working
power of God was displayed in the miracles of the Syl-
vester legend, and the triumph of the Christian faith set
forth in glowing colors. But the hero of these divine
manifestations was no longer Constantine, as in the
earlier legend, it was Sylvester, the priest and bishop.
The emperor took his true place as a mere creature of
this world, the object of God's wrath for his sins, and
the beneficiary of a priest's intercession when his heart
had relented. The kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of
priests, had come into its own ; its glory and its power
made the Roman emperor himself but a miserable, help-
less mortal in comparison with the divine power dis-
pensed by the Pope, the head of the church.

*The revision of the Breviary recently completed consists merely of
a rearrangement of parts and makes little or no change in the contents.
C/., also, under Nov. 9 and 18.

PART THREE

THE SPURIOUS CONSTANTINE: THE CON-
STITUM CONSTANTINI

CHAPTER I

HISTORY OF THE CONSTITUTUM CONSTANTINI

I. The Constitutum Constantini and the Donation it

Contains

We have seen that medieval legends of Constantine,.
especially that of his healing and baptism by Sylvester,
existed in a more or less fluid state. This is true of all
legends, indeed of all narratives in manuscript, and in a
lesser degree even of some printed documents. Varia-
tions in printed books, however, are slight and unim-
portant, compared to those v^hich develop in oral or
manuscript tradition. Many medieval writers, in copy-
ing narratives of others, treated them as an author would
treat his own notes, omitting, adding and changing at
will. Not a little of our modern sense of accuracy and
truth in historical work is due to the mechanical inven-
tion of printing.^ When, therefore, a form of this par-
ticular legend emerged in which Constantine donated
land, privileges and authority to Sylvester as bishop of
Rome and pope, one scarcely knows whether to call it
forgery or romance. Since the author of it, however,
evidently took pains to give what he thought to be a
legal form and specified grants which would really be of
use and importance in his time, it is not too harsh a
judgment to pronounce his words a forgery, such as
even the laws of his own time severely condemned,^

^For this suggestion I am indebted to Professor J. H. Robinson.
^The motive of the forgery will be discussed below, p. 211 et seq.
Cf. also supra, pp. 12-13.

175] 17s

176 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [176

The Donation of Constantine (or Constitutum Con-
stantini, to use the original title of the entire document)^
extended the legend of the Vita Silvestri by expanding
and developing the emperor's expression of piety and
gratitude for his miraculous cure from leprosy. It is a
document of some 3,000 words, purporting to be from
the hand of Constantine, running in his name, and with
the imperial subscription. It contains the usual divisions
of a medieval legal charter: ''invocation of the Trinity,"
''title of the emperor," "address" to Sylvester, "greet-
ing," then a rather long "proem" in the form of a con-
fession of faith and a long "narration" of Constantine's
leprosy and cure by baptism as contained in the Vita Sil-
vestri. After this comes the " disposition " reciting that
since Sylvester is the vicar of the Son of God, he and his
successors shall have enlarged power and greater than
imperial honor, and shall have primacy over the sees of
Antioch, Alexandria, Constantinople (vv^hich even ac-
cording to the legend itself had not yet been founded,
much less made an episcopal see) and Jerusalem, and
over the whole Church universal. Constantine proclaims
that he had built the Lateran church and baptistry and
makes it "head and summit of all churches." He has
built and ornamented the churches of St. Peter and of
St. Paul, and to supply their lamps with oil has given
them endowments in Judea, Greece, Asia, Thrace, Africa,
Italy and various islands. He gives to Sylvester, " chief
priest and pope of the whole Roman world," the Lateran
palace, his own diadem or crown, frigium, collar, purple

* Strictly speaking, the phrase "Donation of Constantine" applies
only to one section of the document, that in which the grant of priv-
ileges and possessions (the donatio) is made, but the use of the phrase
as synonomous with the whole document, the Constitutum Constan-
tini, is so general that it is almost unavoidable.

Ij-j] THE CONSTITUTUM CONSTANTINI 177

robe, scarlet tunic and all imperial insignia, scepter,
seals, etc. To the Roman clergy he gives the privileges
of Roman nobility, the special right to use white cover-
ings for their horses and other distinctive trappings, and,
v^ith the pope, the sole control over entrance to priestly
honors. He deeds his golden diadem again to the pope,
but since it would not be fitting for him to wear this
over his priest's headdress which he wears to the honor
of St. Peter, the emperor proposes to honor him other-
wise, notably by himself acting as his squire and leading
his horse. That the pope's ofifice may not be cheapened,
Constantine again gives him his ow^n palace, also ''the
city of Rome and all the provinces, places and states of
Italy, and the western regions," (i. e. Lombardy,
Venetia, and Istria). He furthermore transfers his own
empire to Byzantium, because ''wdiere the primate of
priests and the head of the Christian religion is estab-
lished by the heavenly emperor, it is not right than an
earthly emperor should have authority there."

Then follows the "sanction" solemnly confirming this
donation forever, and threatening any scofTer, oddly
enough, w^th no physical penalty, but that he would en-
counter the opposition of SS. " Peter and Paul in this
life and the future, and go down to be burned in the lowest
hell with the devil and all the impious." The " corrobora-
tion" follows, afHrming the signatures by the emperor's
own hands (sic), etc.; then follow the final ''protocol"
with the fact of signature indicated, and the benediction,
and the date (in an imaginary and impossible consulship).'

- For full text of the document, cf. Appendix ii. The text I have
used is by far the best one published, from the oldest MS. and splendidly
edited, namely, that of Zeumer, in the Fesigabeiur Rvdolf vonGneist,
Berlin, 1888. This text is also given in Haller, Die Quellen zur
Geschichie der Entstehung des Kirchenstaats (1907, ) p. 241 et seq. There

1/8

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[178

2. Acceptance a7id Use of the Donatio7i''

Such was the document which was incorporated in the
Pseudo-Tsidorean Decretals when this collection was
made in the middle of the ninth century/ It was cited
as authoritative by Ado of Vienne and Hincmar of
Rheims. It was accepted in the collections of canon law
by Anselm of Lucca, Cardinal Deusdedit, the so-called
Ivo of Chartres, Hugo of Fleury, de j^egia potestate et
ecclesiastica dignitate and, though omitted by Gratian
himself, was soon put in his collection under the " palea."
It was referred to as valid or used by many popes, in-
cluding Leo IX, Urban II, Eugenius III, Innocent III,
Gregory IX,^ Innocent IV, Nicholas III, Boniface VIII,
and John XXII. Though Gregory VII apparently did
not use it, his representative, Peter Damiani, did so. It
may possibly have been in the mind of other popes who
exacted oaths from prospective emperors that they would
preserve all the rights and possessions granted by all
previous emperors to the see of St. Peter, and may also
have influenced Hadrian IV. ^

It was accepted by the great majority of the writers of
the Middle Ages, lawyers, historical writers, theologians.
Even those who regretted it or denied its validity, and

are also texts in Grauert, Die Ko^istantinische Schenkung and Friedrich,
ditto: Hinschius, ed., Decretales pseudo-Isidoriafiae (1863), pp. 249-
254; and elsewhere. For English translation, see E. F. Henderson,
Select Historical Documenls of the Middle Ages, pp. 319-329.

^Between 847 and 853, Hinschius, op. cit., p. cci.

^ For extended account of its use by Gregory IX., see Gregcrovius,
Rome in the Middle Ages, vol. v, pp. 185-186.

^ For most of these and some other references, cf. Bollinger, op. cit.,
chapter on "Constant. Schenkung." Cf. also Codex diploniaticus
dominii temporalis s. sedis. I (Rome, 1861), p. 434, for Clement V in
1310. Cf., also Catholic Encyclopedia, Art. "Donation of Constan-
tine."

lyg] THE COXSTITUTUM COXSTANTIWI lyg

Opposed extension of papal power, for the most part did
not question its genuineness. Dante's feelings on the
subject were very strong, but he had no thought of
denying that the donation had taken place.' A difficulty
was involved for the theologians, for they held that the
Pope's power was derived from God, not from man, that
he \vas the successor of St. Peter, and primate of the
Church from the very first. Their talent for harmoni-
zing was highly developed, however, and where they
thought of the inconsistency involved they solved it by
postulating that Constantine's donation was merely a
restitution of what other emperors and ecclesiastics had
usurped from Rome.

The Greeks took the Constitutum Constantini into
their canon law in spite of its exaltation of the bishop of
Rome. This w-as more than counter-balanced in the
eyes of their clergy by the fact that the second ecu-
menical council granted the bishop of Constantinople
privileges similar to those enjoyed by the bishop of
Rome. Thus they were not averse to increasing the
latter. Theodore Balsamon (about 1169) put it in his
collection. Matthew Blastares (about 1335) followed
his example, and it is found in many other places. -It
was used by Greek writers and even by the emperors.^

The legend was carried to the second degree in a
popular story that wdien the donation was made an
angel's voice was heard saying, ''Alas, alas, this day has
poison been dropt into the Church of God."^ This saga

' Cf. Inferno V., ii^ei seq.; De Monarchia, Bcok iii., 10.

' Cf. Bollinger, op. cit., pp. 76-78. It also entered through this
channel into the Russian church. Ibid., p. 120.

' Reginald Pecock, Repressor of overmuch Blaming of the Clergy
(printed Rerum britannicarum medii aevi scriptores no. 19, London ,
i860), p. 351.

l8o COXSTAXTIXE AXD CHRISTIAXITY [igo

evidently grew up among the Ghibellines of Germany,
who saw only evil in the donation. Walther von der
Vogelweide gave eloquent expression to it : King Con-
stantine, he gave so much — as I will tell you — to the see
of Rome, spear, cross and crown. Then the angels
cried, 'Alas! alas! alas! Christendom before stood
crowned with righteousness. Now is poison fallen on
her, and her honey turned to gall. Woe to the world
henceforth ! ' To-day the princes all live in honor, only
their highest one languishes, so works the priests' elec-
tion. Be that denounced to thee, sweet God ! The
priests would upset laym.en's rights : true is the angel's
prophecy." '

It was maintained by some, however, that it was the
devil's voice that was heard, trying to deceive the Church
and lamenting his own defeat. Since the event which
was lamented was entirely im.aginary it will never be
possible to tell which writers had the best ears for dis-
tinguishing sounds from the other world.

The part that the Donation of Constantine played in
the Middle Ages has been strongly emphasized by many
modern historians. The late E. M. Hodgkin^ wrote
that "the story of the Donation of Constantine fully told
would almost be the history of the Middle Ages. * * *
Under Innocent III, Gregory IX, Boniface III, it is
constantly appealed to in support of their pretensions to
rule as feudal suzerains over Italy, over the Holy Roman
Empire, over the world. For three centuries after this,
the canonists take the Donation as the basis of their airy
edifices."

^ Pfeiffer-Bartsch ed., 85, 164. Cited in Taylor, Medieval Mind, ii,
p. 35. For reference to the saying in other writers, cf. Dollinger, op.
cit., p. 112, et seg.

^ Italy and her Invaders, vii, p. 135 et seg. Quoted in part, supra,
p. 13.

l8i] THE CONSTITUTUM COXSTAXTINI i8i

This far overshoots the mark. The Donation undoubt-
edly influenced the formation of politico-ecclesiastical
theories and furnished ammunition to church authorities
for argument. But even in the realm of theory and
argument it was not decisive. Supporters of secular
authority who admitted its genuineness extracted its
sting by many ingenious devices. Some maintained
that it was not valid because Constantine was a heretic,
baptized or rebaptized in the Arian heresy.' Some
argued that it was invalid because the empire could not
be alienated without the consent of the people, which
was lacking.^ Some limited the validity of the gift to
Constantine's own reign. Others turned the Donation
into a back-handed blow at the papacy by the fact that
it represented papal primacy and honor as derived, not
from God, but from the emperor. ^ On the other hand,
it is significant that the first pope who gained a clear
conception of the full possibilities of the papacy, the man
whose genius and soaring aspirations forecast both Inno-
cent III and the Vatican Council of 1870, Gregory VII,

^ Cf. Geroch of Reichersperg, Expos, in Psalm. Ixiv.

^ Jacob Almain, of Paris, and Peter Dubois, also held it illegal. John
Quidort, of Paris (1306) took a similar position. Schard, Syntagma
variorum autorum de jurisdictione imperiali, etc. (Basle, 1566, 1609),
p. 208 et seq., publishes extracts from many medieval writers. Cf.
also, Dollinger, op. cit., 105.

^Wyclit: " Certum videtur ex chronicis quod non a Christo sed a
Caesare Constantino Romanus episcopus accepit vel usurpavit potesta-
tem." Wilkins. Concil. iii., 344. So also the Waldenses: " Nam
error Waldensium fuit, successoribus apostolorum, scilicet papae et
praelatis ecclesiasticis, dominium in temporalibus repugnare, nec eis
licere habere divitias temporales. Unde ecclesiam Dei, et successores
apostolorum et veros praelatos ecclesiae Dei. durasse dicunt tantum
usque ad Sylvestrum papam, a quo donatione facta ecclesiae per Con-
stantinum impera^-orem, dicunt incepisse Romanam ecclesiam, quae
modo secundum ipsos non est Dei ecclesia." John of Paris (c. 1322)
in Schard, op. cit., p. 113.

l82 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [182

SO far as we know made no use whatever of the sup-
posed deed of Constantine.

Moreover, all these theories of canon law had less in-
fluence upon the actual course of events and growth of
institutions than is often supposed. Claims might be
supported by appeal to precedents and documents, but
these were seldom their real source. They sprang rather
out of aggressive ambition, and usually met that m.easure
of success which their promoters had material or moral
power to enforce. Claims realized embodied themselves
in canon law and political theory. Here, as usual, theory
generally followed after fact and practical program.
The Protestant reformers and subsequent Protestant
writers, holding the papacy to be a usurpation, exagger-
ated the importance of extreme papal claims. When
they attacked it on moral grounds they greatly over-
stated the role of forged docum.ents in attaining the ful-
filment of these claims.

"Historical research does not support those who say
that the dignity of the papacy was only acquired in the
Middle Ages by violent usurpations, bold plundering
and forged deeds. Such have not been wanting, indeed,
but they have never been determinative nor decisive.
The tree was of such sturdy and purposeful growth that
we can say that even without forged deeds, bold usurpa-
tion, etc., its development would scarcely have been dif-
ferent. Here, as usual, the actual development of internal
control and power over others came first, and then
followed theories, legal maxims, occasionally also forger-
ies, in order to give existing power a biblical and histor-
ical foundation. These theories then, later, redounded
to the advantage of the existing power, but they did not
found that power.'"

^ A. Harnack, in a lecture delivered in the Aula of Berlin University

THE CONSTITUTUM CONSTANTINI

183

Aside from the manner of its origin and from its influ-
ence in advancing the desires of the papacy, the significance
of the Donation of Constantine lies chiefly in the illustra-
tion it affords of the contrast between the church of the
eighth and ninth century and that of the fourth and fifth.
In the earlier days Christian imagination created an im-
age of a pious emperor converted by miracle from pagan-
ism and doing everything for the glory of God. In the
later time, this was not enough. There must be suprem-
acy for the ecclesiastical organization, there must be
lands, government, and an imperial crown to dispose of
for the bishop of Rome. This had become by the eighth
century one of the aspirations of medieval Christianity.
''The tendency of the whole age, as expressed in the
forgery, ran toward wedding the spiritual power to
worldly advantages, rights, and honors."'

in 191 1, and published in his ''Aus Wissenschaft und Leben " (1911),
vol. i, p. 214. The same view is held by Taylor, Medieval Mind, ii,
273-274.

' Hartmann, Geschichte Italiens im Mittelalter, Bd. ii, Hfte. ii
(Gotha, 1903), p. 225.

CHAPTER II

EXPOSURE OF THE FORGERY

I. Stages of Criticism

The work of historical criticism in showing up the
Donation of Constantine is one of the most interesting
chapters in the intellectual development of Europe. In
mere bulk it looms very large, larger even than the im-
portance of the document itself would seem to warrant ;
many books, and short general discussions without end.
The intellectual class in Europe as well as the unedu-
cated, passed through a long stage of uncritical accept-
ance of it. Europe, as a whole, held to it in the face
of the sharp, though limited and ineffectual, criticism
it received in the twelfth century. This criticism was
renewed and enlarged in the fourteenth century. But it
was only the attack made upon it in the renaissance of
the fifteenth century, culminating in Valla's work, that
definitely exposed the forgery. The Protestant contro-
versy concerning it, and the modern scientific, historical
criticism of the last fifty years, make up the last chapters
in its study.

2. Criticism of the Donation^^ previous to the Fifteenth

Century

The general acceptance of the document by the Middle
Ages, in most cases without question of its genuineness,
illustrates as much as any one thing could, the relative
lack of the historical, scientific spirit in that stage of
European thought. Consider what the Germans call the
184 [184

185] EXPOSURE OF THE FORGERY 185

shrieking inconsistencies of the whole forgery; Con-
stantine giving the Roman see primacy over that of
Constantinople, before that city was founded, even ac-
cording to the account in the Sylvester Legend itself,
the application of such terms as satraps to Roman
officials, the purported transfer of the government of
Italy to the pope in the face of the actual continuation
of imperial rule without any reference to papal authority
and without any records of such a change. Consider
also that the Middle Ages all the time possessed, in
Jerome, the Historia Tripartita^ and elsewhere, ma-
terial for refuting the forgery and the whole story of
Constantine's conversion through cure of leprosy, and
for getting at the approximate facts about Constantine
and Sylvester. Surely we have here an illustration of
the fact that truth does not always prevail. Its preva-
lence, even in the long run of centuries, depends on
whether men really seek for it, and on what training and
facilities they have in ascertaining it and its traces. In
the absence of sound historical criticism, in the face of a
strong tendency to harmonize inconsistencies, historical
truth gives way in a single generation to wild and absurd
legends.

But the so-called Middle Ages were not altogether
uncritical. Our first notice of an attack comes in a
document whose genuineness is open to serious doubt.
If wx may believe this. Otto III, at the end of the twelfth
century, in a grant to Sylvester II, stigmatized the Do-
nation of Constantine as a fiction.' But the twelfth

Haec sunt enim commenta ab illi ipsis inventa, quibus Joanness
diaconus, cognomento digitorum mutius Cmutilus) praeceptum aureis
litteris scripsit, sub titulo magni Constantini Icnga mendacii tempora
finxit. * * ■'^ " Spretis ergo commenticiis praeceptis et imaginarii
scriptis, ex nostra liberalitate sancto Petro donamus quae nostra sunt,
non sibi quae sua sunt veluti nostra conferimus." ( Baronius Ann. 1191,
No. 57).

1 86 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [i86

century brought on a fire of criticism. In the pontifi-
cate of Paschal II, in 1104 or 1105, the Donation was
used as authority by some Roman nobles for their pos-
session, under the papacy, of a certain castle. Their
opponents, the monks of a Sabine Benedictine monastery,
Farfa, contested that at most the document could give
only spiritual power, that the pope had no earthly author-
ity such as was claimed, and that if Constantine had
really made any such grant of land the popes would not
afterwards have sought any land for buildings, or con-
firmation of the emperor's name, as they did.'

Some fifty years later Wetzel, of the party of Arnold
of Brescia, discredited the whole legend of Sylvester and
the Donation. The Arnoldists were naturally led by
their peculiar views of the papacy to level their guns
against this buttress of its temporal power. Wetzel's
contention was that Constantine was already a Christian
before he met Sylvester. In support of this he cited the
Historia Tripa^'tita as well as an apocryphal document,
which he found in the pseudo-Isidore and in Gratian, in
which Miltiades or Melchiades, the predecessor of Syl-
vester, refers to Constantine's great munificence to the
Roman Church. Looking to Emperor Frederic I for
cooperation against the political power of tlie pope,
Wetzel wrote (1152) that the lying and heretical fable
was so thoroughly exposed that scholars could not de-
fend it before the uneducated, and that the pope and

' Cf. Dollinger, op. cit., p. 94; Mancini, Lorenzo Valla, pp. 145, 146.
For this monastery, cf. Kehr, Regesta Pontificum Romanorum : Italia
Pontificia, vol. ii, Latium, pp. 57-69. Cf. also Historiae Farfens. in
Pertz, M. G. H. xiii, 571 ; the Registrum of Farfa published by J.
Georgi and U. Balzani ; and Gregorius Catinensis in Scriptores Rerutn
Italicarum, vol. ii, part ii, p. 637.

^Printed in Migne, P. L., viii, col. 566 ei seq.

iSy-j EXPOSURE OF THE FORGERY 187

cardinals hardly showed themselves for shame/ Un-
fortunately for the Arnoldists, however, the emperor had
as little use for them as did the pope. Wetzel failed to
produce any effect upon him, and in the overthrow of
the Arnoldists, their arguments, also, for all practical
purposes, fell to the ground/

Echoes of this and other attacks, however, continued
to reverberate through Europe. Gottfried of Bamberg
in his Pantheon, dedicated to Urban III (in 1186) treats
of the matter in the form of a debate between a papist
who defends the Donation on the ground that God would
not permit errors on such weighty points, and an im-
perialist who cited the continuance of imperial rule and
the division of the whole empire between Constantine's
sons. Leopold of Bebenburg shortly after made the
same point as this hypothetical Ghibelline. ^ But neither
Gottfried or Leopold gave his own conclusion.

Marsiglio of Padua, early in the fourteenth century, is
also not quite clear about the matter. He speaks of the
document as though he had no faith in it, but welcomes
it as proving that the pope's worldly pomp and claims of
universal power came not from Christ, but from the em-
peror. For this last proposition he cites no less author-
ity than St. Bernard who declared that the popes in
their worldly pomp were successors of Constantine, not
of St. Peter. ^ Marsiglo's attitude was not an uncommon

' Martene and Durand, Amplissima collectio veternm scriptorum, ii
(1724), 556, epist. 384.

* C7. Dollinger, op. cit., pp. 94-95. He is inclined elsewhere to place
the historical criticism of the Donation in the twelfth century on a
higher level than that of the fifteenth.

'Schard, op. cit., p. 391.
Defensor pads, Dictio II., cap. ii. Reprinted in Schard, op. cit.
Marsiglio's " Tractatus de translatione imperii." also touches upon
Constantine's removal to the East and his supposed grant to the Pope.
Cf. extract in Schard, op. cit., pp. 154-156.

l88 CONSTAXTIXE AND CHRISTIANITY [i88

one in his time, he merely gave it the increased, weight
of his authority. Thereafter, he seems to have been a
model whom other writers copied, sometimes almost
verbally in their statement of the case. '

The contest in France against papal control kept the
question from entirely dying out for nearly a hundred
years longer. It remained for the time of the Renais-
sance, however, to effectively establish the fact that the
Donation was a forgery unworthy of any credence.
Early writers had the acumen to arrive at or near this
conclusion, but not until the middle of the fifteenth cen-
tury was the equipment of historical critics and the state
of public opinion such as to drive in and fasten down
this achievement of awakening thought.

3. The Contest Against the Papacy in the Fifteenth Cen-
tury. Cusanus' Criticism of the Donation''
For more than a hundred years, that is, during the
so-called Babylonian Captivity of the papacy, and the era
of reforming councils, the papacy had been under fire.
The rising sentiment of nationality, especially in north-
ern Europe, had been seeking intermittently to curb the
financial and the political ambitions of the Roman See.
Reformers had been seeking for some way of ending and
of preventing scandals in the church due to the confusion
into which the Roman See had fallen. They had studied
the history of the church, they had examined, in ancient
authors, the historical grounds upon which the claims of
the papacy rested. They had come to the council of Con-
stance, not only with the purpose of ending the Great
Schism, but wdth ideas about the reorganization of
ecclesiastical government and revising the relations of

* C/. Radulphus (Pandulfus, or Landulph) de Columna, in his " de
translatione imperii," dated by Schard, 1324 A. D., and printed by
him, op. cit., p. 161.

EXPOSURE OF THE FORGERY

church and state. The former purpose had been accom-
plished at Constance, but the realization of the latter,
though to some extent accepted in principle there, had
been postponed.

The Council of Basle, assembled in 1431, was the
agency through which the discontented element sought
to effect the desired changes and reorganization. A
strong and able group there contended vigorously for
a system of conciliar government for the church, instead
of papal absolutism. When the pope, Eugenius IV,
ordered the dissolution of the council, the latter bore
itself resolutely, reasserted the principles of Constance,
and continued its work.

Among the leaders in the championship of the council
was Nicholas of Cues, better known as Nicholas of
Cusa, or Cusanus (1401-1461), deacon of St. Florinus of
Coblenz. Educated in the school of the Brethren of the
Common Life at Deventer, and later at the University of
Padua, he was both a pious churchman and one of the
greatest, if not the greatest, ecclesiastical scholar of his
generation. He wrote (1433) ^oi* the direction of the
council, and in justification of its platform, a work which
he called " De concordantia catholica,^' and which pre-
sented "the ideal of the reforming party, a united Church
reformed in soul and body, in priesthood and laity, by
the action of a Council which should represent on earth
the eternal unity of Heaven." '

Cusanus later left the Council of Basle, as Cardinal
Cesarini and others did, discouraged at the outcome of
events and at the extremes to which the council went,

^ M. Creighton, A History of the Papacy during the Period of the
Reformation, vol. ii (1882), p. 232. For an appreciation of Nicholas
of Cusa, cf. Janssen, History of the German People at the Close of the
Middle A^es, Eng. trans. (London, 1908) i, 2-5.

igo CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [igo

and labored to restore the Papal power which once he
had striven to upset." ' He became one of the most ef-
fective representatives of Eugenius in the restoration of
papal authority and influence. At the Diet of Mainz,
in 1439, he advised that only part of the Basle decrees be
accepted again in 1441, and ably championed the cause
of the pope against that of the council.'' He retained,
however, at least many of his liberal ideas, and later gave
expression to them in his remarkable work, De pace
sen Concorda7itia Fidei (1453), a most notable appeal
for religious liberty. ^

Among the foundations of papal power and claims
which Cusanus examined in his De concordantia catho-
Itca,'' was the Donation of Constantine. His work was
used as a sort of text-book by the council : this section
of it was presented, November 7, 1433, at the fourteenth
session. It fully maintains the high standard of the rest
of the work, and all things considered, is probably the
most notable treatment ever given the ''Donation."^
Valla's treatise is longer, more rhetorical, and much
better known ; but Valla in all probability had this work
to guide him.

He called attention to the absence of any reference to
the transaction or the document in early writings, which
he said he had searched thoroughly with this in mind.
Certain histories tell of Constantine being baptized by
Sylvester, and of presents given the Church by the for-
mer, but none speak of any transfer of temporal power.

^M. Creighton, op. cit,. p. 232.

' For a full account of the Council of Basle and a judicious statement
of Cusanus' share in it, cf. Creighton, op. cit., vol. ii, chaps, iv-x.

^ Cf. G. L. Burr: " Anent the Middle Ages," in American His-
torical Review, xviii, 710-713.

*For text of Cusanus' discussion, cf. infra, pp. 237-241.

igi] EXPOSURE OF THE FORGERY igi

That this last resided in the emperor was recognized by
the popes after Sylvester. It was Pippin, and later
Charlemagne, who conferred Italian states upon the
papacy. Cusa cites passages in papal correspondence
showing that imperial jurisdiction prevailed in Italy long
after this grant to the pope was supposed to have been
made. He makes a critical comparison of the legends
of the Roman baptism with Jerome's statements and his-
torical facts. He shows that the Donation was not in
the original collection of canon laws made by Gratian,
but was added later under ''Palea." His conclusion is
that the Donation is a more than doubtful argument for
papal power, that it is really worse than nothing.

4. Valla s Treatise
Lorenzo Valla, however, made the most decisive on-
slaught upon the Donation, and the most famous. ^
Nicholas of Cusa had written about it as one of many
questions, in the tone of scholarly investigation. Valla
made an impassioned oratorical denunciation which sin-
gled it out as a crime against European civilization. The
fame of the author, the power of his appeal, and ensuing
contests against the papacy combined to connect the ex-
posure of the forgery almost entirely with the latter
name.

Valla embodied to a superlative degree most of the
merits, and some of the faults, of the scholarship of the
Renaissance. To find his closest analogy one must study
the Italian condottieri, highly skilled, keen, reckless sol-
diers of fortune. He was an intellectual condottiere^ well

^The best life of Valla is in Italian, G. Mancini; Vita di Lorenzo
Valla, Firenze 1891. A good account, with many of Valla's letters, is
that of Earozzi e Sabbadini, Studi sul Panormita e sul Valla, publica-
zioni del R. instituto di studi supericri practici e di perfezionamento in
Firenze, sezione di filosofia e filologia (1891), pp. 49-265.

192 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [192

equipped for literary combats, now fighting as a free
lance for interests that appealed to him, now making
peace with the enemy and serving him for pay. Indeed
the real enemy was not injustice. It was not even ignor-
ance, though he waged incessant warfare against it. The
bitterest enemy of the Italian humanist was most likely
to be his fellow condottiere. Even his warmest friend
was apt to become his competitor and his rival. An at-
tack upon the purity of one's Latinity, and Valla was
always making them, ' was sure to provoke an invective
in which the honor of one's mother, one's character and
his private conduct were assailed with accusations as
scandalous as they were unfounded. Popes at Rome
could more easily forgive attacks upon their temporal
power, than an Italian humanist a correction in his gram-
mar.

But in all these clouds of dust there was many a flash
of light. Valla, especially, had genuine critical insight
and was far from lacking scientific love of truth. Eras-
mus valued highly his grammatical notes on the New
Testament and his critical works on the Latin language.

Where is the man," he wrote, "whose heart is so nar-

^ Cf. Poggio's epigram:

"Nunc postquam Manes defunctus Valla petivit,
Non audet Pluto verba Latina loqui,
Juppiter hunc superis dignatus honore fuisset
Censorem linguae sed timet ipse suae."

" Since Valla went the trembling Shades to seek
No word of Latin Pluto dares to speak.
Jove fears to call him to the blest abodes
Lest carping censure vex the blameless gods."

— Translation in Nichols, Epistles of Erasmus, p. 69.
2 C/. Valla's literary feuds with Fazzio, Antonio da Ro, Antonio Pan-
ormita, Poggio and Benedictus Morandus, in the works of Valla and
his opponents. For summary cf. Nisard: Les Gladiateurs de la Re-
publigite des Lettres, vol. i (Paris, i860).

193]

EXPOSURE OF THE FORGERY

193

rowed by jealousy, as not to have the highest praise for
Valla, a man who with so much energy, zeal and labor,
refuted the stupidities of the barbarians, saved half-buried
letters from extinction, restored Italy to her ancient
splendor of eloquence, and forced even the learned to
express themselves henceforth with more circumspec-
tion." ' His criticism of institutions and ethics was no
less keen, even if sometimes marked by a recklessness
and lack of balance matched only by careful concealment
of his personal convictions. There are passages in his
writings which break not only with medieval but with
Christian morals as a whole. These, however, were
carefully put in the mouths of other speakers. He fore-
stalled Machiavelli's political theories in dismissing
Dante's conception of the Empire as the head of civil
power, in branding the papacy as the cause of disunion
in Italy, and in dignifying the modern state.

Such was the remarkable man who, in 1440, as royal
secretary of Alfonso at Naples, wrote the treatise De
falso credita et ementita Constanthii Donatione.^ He
was led to compose the treatise, not only by the echoes
of the council of Basle as they reverberated throughout
Europe, but by the local situation in Italy.

Alfonso of Aragon had claimed the Neapolitan crown

^Cf. Nichols, Epistles of Erasmus, p. 70.

The theory that he wrote it at a later time and finished it in the
papal archives was a baseless invention of a later invective against him,
as was the story that he had to flee from Rome on account of it to save
his life. It apparently never caused him more than a temporary em-
barrassment later, and a feeble apology when he applied for a position
at the papal court. Cf. Mancini, op. cit. index under Valla, and Valla's
letter in Barrozi e Sabbadini, op. cit, pp. 94-96. The treatise is printed
in Valla's Opera, and in many separate editions. It is printed with a
long and uncritical, polemical introduction and French translation by
Bonneau, and with an Italian translation by G. Vincenti. Cf. infra,
Bibliography, under Valla.

194

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[194

Upon the death of Giovanna II in 1435, on the ground of
his having been adopted heir by her, as well as of the
older Aragonese pretensions. Pope Eugenius, however,
claimed the kingdom of Naples as a papal fief and op-
posed Alfonso. The latter was captured by the victor-
ious fleet of the Genoese, who were looking after their
commercial interests, off the island of Ponza, and held
prisoner for a while by Filippo Maria Visconti, at Milan,
which then controlled Genoa, but he succeeded in form-
ing an alliance with Filippo Maria and thus finally got
control in Naples. The pope, however, headed a league
embracing Florence, Venice and Genoa (after the revolt
from Milan) and continued the fight against Alfonso.
It was not until 1442 that the latter was able to firmly
establish himself at Naples. The bitterness of his party
against Eugenius was naturally great, and was increased
by the pope's entrusting his interests and the conduct of
the war to the notoriously cruel Cardinal Vitteleschi.
Alfonso fought the pope, not only with an army, but
with literary forces as well. He strongly supported the
faction hostile to the papacy at Basle, and sought in
general to undermine the moral and legal foundation of
the papal power. For this latter purpose his secretary,
Valla, was an incomparable agent. He contributed to
his patron's warfare a bitter arraignment of the temporal
power of the papacy, cleverly taking as his text the forg-
ery of the Donation of Constantine.'

Writers who have approached this work through a
study of Valla, or from a Protestant point of view, have

' For the situation in Italian politics v*^hich called forth Valla's treatise,
cf. Creighton, op. ciL, ii, 170-172, 228; Barrozi, in Barozzi e. Sabbadini,
op. ciL. 222-265; Mancini, Vita di Lorenzo Valla, 137-145; Gregoro-
vius, Rome in the Middle Ages (Eng. trans, from the fourth German
ed.), vol. vii, pp. 62-64, 84-85.

ic;-] EXPOSURE OF THE FORGERY ig-

generally given it extravagant praise/ while many, im-
patient of its rhetorical form, or reading only the ora-
torical opening, have seen little of value in it.^ In truth
the work is not as original as has often been assumed.
Valla was a friend and admirer of Nicholas of Cusa,^ and
there is reason for thinking that much of his historical
criticism is based on Nicholas' earlier work. The crit-
icism of the language and vocabulary of the Constitutum
Constantini, however, which is a considerable part of the
treatise, must have been largely a product of Valla's own
literary studies. Errors such as the use of the apocry-
phal letter of ]\Ielchiades to overthrow the apocryphal
Donation, the belief drawn through secondary sources
fromx Eusebius' Church History that Constantine was
always a Christian, failure to use Eusebius' Life of Con-
stantine or even Jerome's statement of the Nicomedian
baptism, were only to be expected of one writing in the
fifteenth century. But Valla used old Roman coins
which he had in his own possession as historical evi-
dence, and his reasoning was usually sound and his
method of approach skilfully chosen. His work is not
unworthy to stand as one of the landmarks in the rise
of historical criticism..

The point of Valla's treatise is that the Donation is a
forgery, and that the temporal power of the pope is in
any case bad and should be abolished. He makes no
attempt to ascertain the date or circumstances of the

g. Strauss, Ulrich von Hutten, (1877) p. 2Ci; Gieseler, Text-book
of Church History (New York, 1863), iii, p. 473, n. 2; Wolff, Lo7'enzo
Valla, pp. 60, 79; Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders (2nd ed.), vii, 154;
Gregorovius, Rome ifi the Middle Ages (3rd ed.), vii, pp. 535, 571-573.

^E.g. Dollinger, ed. Yiitdr'ich., Papstfabeln , p. 118; Nisard. op.cit.y
i, p. 279 et passim.

^ Cf. letters in Barozzi e Sabbadini. op. cit., pp. 115. 128.

1 96 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [196

forgery, as indeed no one does for a hundred and fifty
years after him. His proof that the Donation was a for-
gery is varied both in form and in value. He begins
with a rather clever discussion of the improbability of
the whole thing, showing how Constantine could not
have made the donation and how, if it had been made,
Sylvester would have refused it in a speech expatiating
on the incompatibility of the temporal power with
the spiritual. He finds no trace of any transfer or
change of officials; imperial rule continued in the west
as before the supposed grant. The best historians,
Eusebius and Rufinus, say that Constantine was a
Christian before Sylvester's pontificate, and a letter of
Melchiades ^ clearly proves it. Moreover, the Donation
is not in the body of canon law, it was added under
the Palea. The whole pseudo-Gelasian literature and
the Vita (or Gesta) Sylvestri is discredited. Valla used
effectively the argument from the barbarous and in-
correct language of the document and inconsistencies
in its account of events. Not having adequate Roman
calendars or Fasti he failed to detect the error in
dating. He accepted the Eusebian authorship of the
Vita Sylvestri, but took this as discrediting it, because
Greeks were proverbial liars ; the Vita therefore is not
apocryphal, but lying ! As for confirmation and accept-
ance of the Donation as genuine by the rulers of the
Holy Empire, Valla held these emperors to be creatures
of the papacy. He was even less imperialist than papist.
He ends as he began, with an attack upon the whole
system of papal government in civil affairs.

This treatise, written before printing was developed,
did not at first receive a wide circulation. Valla himself

^ Which, however, is a palpable forgery.

197]

EXPOSURE OP THE PORGERY

197

esteemed it as one of his best and greatest works and
circulated it privately among his friends.' Poggio, how-
ever, in his bitter invectives against Valla, did not men-
tion this treatise, and apparently did not know of it. In
a defence of himself to Eugenius IV, made in the effort
to obtain a position at Rome, Valla excused himself from
many damaging charges of heresy, but said nothing
about the attack on the Donation, probably because it
had not become well enough known to occasion contro-
versy and call for defence.^ He had had occasion to re-
fer to it, though, in writing to influential friends at
Rome, and to apologize for it. He protested his full
devotion to the Holy See and attributed this indiscre-
tion to bad advice as well as to his regrettable passion
for controversy and fame.^ In asking, however, in 1443,
for the friendly influence of Cardinal Ludovico Scarampo
in getting him back to Rome, he justified his work as
solely an attempt to ascertain and establish the truth.'*

^ E. g. letter to Giiarino, from Naples, Nov., 1443: * ♦ ♦ mittam ego
tibi vicissim meam oration em, quae etiam ipsa prope tota in contentione
versatur: " de false credita et ementita donatione Constantini." Dices:
" pacisci mecum vis." Minimi: " sed nisi orationem meam non
videris, mittendam esse non piito tibi. Rescribes igitur an Pliniana
Laurentianaque oratio in manus tuas venerit. Si utroque, tu Plinianam
ad me mittes; si neutra, ego ad te meam Laurentianam mittam; si
Laurentiana, neuter ad alterium aliquam orationem mittet." In
Barozzi e Sabbadini, op. cit , p. 93

Valla also sent a copy to Aurispa, writing " qua nihil magis oratorium
scripsi." In Epistolae niundi procerum " Calso referred to as Epis-
tolae prhicipum) , Venice, 1574, p. 361, cf. also pp. 375, 346.

In 1443 he also wrote to Cardinal Ludovico Scarampo, in the letter
quoted below, " Opus meum [de Constantini donatione] ccnditum edi-
tumque est, quod emendare aut supprimere nec possem si deberem, nec
deberem si possem.'' Barrozzi e Sabbadini, op. cit., p. 96.
Opera, p. 795.

^ Cf. letter to Landriana, c. 1445, cited by Gregorovius, Rome in the
Middle Ages, vii, p. 574, and Nisard, op. cit., i, p. 279.

At cur ' de Constantini donatione ' composui? Kcc est quod pur-

198

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

His mingled protestations of innocence and veiled
hints that more might be said than he had said in his
treatise, produced no results during the pontificate of
Eugenius IV. Nicholas V, however, finally did appoint
him to an apostolic secretaryship in 1448 and gave him
many marks of favor, especially in connection with his
translations of Greek authors. How much the pope was
influenced in this by Valla's urgency, by the policy of
silencing an enemy by taking him. into the papal camp,
or by genuine interest in Valla's scholarly work, it is
impossible to tell. I am inclined, however, to think that
the last was the main reason for Nicholas' action.

Valla's treatise, however, did not remain without in-

gare habeam, ut quod nonnulli obtrectent mihi et quasi crimen intendant.
Id ego tantum abest ut malivolenlia fecerim, ut summopere optassem
sub alio pontifice necesse mihi fuisse id facere, ncn sub Eugenio [the
reigning pope]. Neque vero attinet hoc tempore libelli mei causam
defendere nisi Gamalielis verbis, ' Si est ex hominibus consilium hoc
aut opus, dissolvetur; sin autemexdeo, non poteritis dissolvere.' Opus
meum conditum editumque est; quod emendare aut supprimere nec
possem si deberem, nec deberem si possem. Ipsa rei Veritas se tuebi-
tur aut ipsa falsitas se coarguet. Alii de illo judices arbitrique sunt,
non ego. Si male locutus sum, testimonium perhibebunt de malo; sin
bene, non caedent me nervisaequi judices. Sedopus illud in suaquaeso
causa quiescere sinamus. Hoc tantum consideres velim, non odiopapae
adductum, sed veritatis sed religionis sed cujusdam gloriae et famae
gratia motum, ut quod nemo sciret id ego scisse solus viderer. Multum
etiam nocere potuissem, si alieno animo fuissem in rebus quae mentem
animumque magis sollicitant. Nan quod feci, hoc non modo adpudorem
praesentium, sed mortuorum etiam ac futurorum pertinet; qui enim
nemini parcit, nullum laedit. Verum cum non minus prodesse in pos-
terum possim quam uno libello offendi, per ego te superiorum temporum
meam in summum pontificem benivolentiam pietatemque obsecro id,
quod cum per se facile, turn vero tuae virtuti facillimum; non beneficium
non munis non gratiam non veniam, sed ut similis tibi sis, ut quod
semper fecisti facias, ne aliter ac sentis de animo ergo me tuosummique
pontificis rescribas, etiamsi me tibi odio esse nec licere mihi in patriam
Tedire dicas." Barozzi e Sabbadini, op. cit., pp. 95-56.

For a letter to Cardinal Gerardo in a similar strain cf. ibid., p. 104.

199]

EXPOSURE OF THE FORGERY

199

fluence. It probably added to Porcaro's anti-papal con-
victions and affected also the character of the teaching
of Pomponius Laetus.' Valla's name more than that of
any other man is associated by writers of his century, as
well as by those of later times, with the refutation of the
Donation. Hutten some seventy years later found it
being read in Italy and got at least two copies of it
there.' Others, however, wrote upon the subject, some
probably independently of Valla.^

5. Other Critics in the Time of the Renaissance

Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini in a treatise begun by him
while on the im.perialist side, some thirteen years after
Valla's {i. e., c. 1453) and revised, but left incomplete
several months before he became Pope Pius II, describes
an imaginary dialogue in which St. Bernard of Siena,
Peter of Nocete and himself figure, and Valla is men-
tioned.In this dialogue there occurs as complete a
refutation of the Donation of Constantine as Valla had
given, and at some points a more valid line of attack.
The baptism of Constantine at Nicomedia, when an old
man, is here affirmed correctly as excluding the w^hole
story of the Roman baptism; which is quite an improve-
ment upon Valla.

Reginald Pecock, bishop of St. Asaph, and later of

' Cf. Pastor, History of the Popes, ii, p. 221; iv, 42; Gregorovius, op.
cit., vii, pp. 131, 575; Creighton, op. cit., ii, 308-311 et passim.
Cf. infra, p. 203 et seq.

' It is interesting to note, however, that Nicholas Tudeschi, esteemed
the greatest canon lawyer of Valla's time, wrote, "whoever denies the
Donation of Constantine is to be suspected of heresy." Consil. 84, n.
2 cap. "per venerabilem."

*Pius ii, Oraiiones, i, 25; iii, 85-100; Piccolomini, Opera Inedita,
p. 26s et seq.; Mansi, Conciliorum Collectio, xxx, 1203; cf. Mancini,
op. cit., pp. 148-149.

200

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[200

Chichester, discussed the ''Donation" in his famous
book The Repressor of over much Blaming of the
Clergy,"^ written about nine years after Valla's treatise,
but probably independently of it. Pecock's criticism
shows remarkable accuracy in investigation and is based
almost entirely upon genuine historical sources. He,
also, accepts the baptism at Nicomedia, as did Aeneas
Sylvius, as the only historical one; criticises the whole
Sylvester legend; marks the absence of early references
to the Donation ; cites requests of early popes from the
emperors, which show that the former, long after Syl-
vester, recognized the latter as their temporal sover-
eigns. He shows the actual course of events in the
growth of the temporal power through the donations of
Pippin, Charlemagne, Louis the Pious, and Countess
Mathilda. His reasoning throughout is sound and con-
vincing.

A scholar now little known, described as the Reverend
Father in God, Hieronymus Paulus Cathalanus, Canoni-
cus of Barcelona, LL. D., and a secretary of Alexander
VI, has left a note combining the proofs of Valla and
Aeneas Sylvius, and referring to other similar writings.^
It probably represents the view of the Donation gen-
erally held among the best scholars of the papal court at
the end of the century.^

^Printed in the Rolls Series {Rerum britannicatum mediiaevi scrip-
tores^ no. iq), London, i860, xix, xx, 35C-5C6, and assigned by Whar-
ton in Appendix, 102, to the year 1449. For a recent account of Peccck
see article in The English Historical Reziew, xxvi (1911), pp. 448-468,
by E. M. Blackie.

^Printed in the Reformation pamphlet, " De donatione Constantini
quid veri habeat * * * ut in versa pagella videbis."

* Guicciardini (1483-1540) Istoria d' Italia (1775 ed.), vol. i, pp. 385-
3^5, shows by his annihilation of the Donation, that it found no cre-
dence among men of letters in his circle.

2oi] EXPOSURE OF THE FORGERY 201

Some who were acquainted with the general trend of
the argument did not give it their complete assent. The
celebrated theologian and casuist Antoninus, archbishop
of Florence (1446-1459)/ says that the Donation was
not in the oldest manuscripts of canon law, and while
accepted by theologians and canon-lawyers, is rejected
by secular lawyers. For himself he holds it as at m.ost a
restitution by the emperor of power and property which
belonged to the pope originally by divine right.

There was some attempt to defend the Donation as
genuine. Cortesi brought forth an Antivalla (about
1464) which consisted chiefly of a slanderous account of
Valla and of the circumstances under which he wrote,
and of the condemnation he received. It still remains in
manuscript.^ There is also a report of an answer in 1458
to a trouble-making Hussite in Strassburg who insisted
too vigorously that the Donation was a forgery ; he was
burned at the stake. ^ An equally convincing proof of
the genuineness of the Donation was made later at
Rome in the pontificate of Julius II, when one Bar-
tholemeus Picernus (or Pincernus) produced a copy of
it purporting to be a Latin translation of a Greek
original.

The day of the Donation, however, was past. By the
time of Alexander VI it had, in many quarters, become
a joke. A story runs that when that pope asked for a
copy of the grant on the basis of which Venice claimed
control of the Adriatic, the Venetian Girolamo Donato

^ In his " Chronicon partibus tribus distincta ab initio mnndi ad
mccclix," (Venice, 1474-9), printed, also, in " De donatione Constan-
tini quid veri habeat," etc.

"^Cf. Mancini, op. cit., pp. 160-162. Another fifteenth-century refu-
tation was by Giovanni Antonio di Sangiorgio, Cardinal Allesandrino,.
no longer extant.

'Cited by Friedrich, in his ed. of Dollinger, Papstfabeln, p. 118.

202

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[202

replied that he would find it written on the back of the
Donation of Constantine.' Ariosto's reference is akin
to this :

Then to a hill of vary'd flowers they went
That sweet before, now yields a fetid scent;
This (let me dare to speak) that present showed,
Which on Sylvester Constantine bestowed. ^

By the beginning of the sixteenth century the Dona-
tion was thus thoroughly discredited. Ecclesiastical as
well as secular scholarship generally recognized that it
was a gross forgery. Though we have seen that many
writers contributed to this result, the refutation of the
forgery seems to have been generally attributed to Valla.
While not as yet printed, his treatise had become known
to many in the latter half of the fifteenth century, and
many manuscript copies of it seemx to have been in ex-
istence.3 The treatise was referred to in at least one
scholastic disputation in Germany, at Tubingen, as early
as 1506."^ The literary merits of the work, the incisive-
ness and cleverness of its arraignment of the temporal
power of the papacy, as well as the fact that it was by
far the most pretentious expose of the Donation, doubt-
less fostered the tendency to assign the whole merit of
the critical achievement to it, a tendency which still
continues among modern writers.^

^ Cf. Mancini; op. cit., p. 159.

^Orlando furioso, bk. xxxiv, v 80, Hoole's trans., xxxiv, 1. 622 et seq.
" Di vari fiore ad un grand monte passa,
Chi ebbe gia buono odore, or puzza forte;
Questo era il dono (se pero dir lece)
Che Constantino al buon Silvestro fece."

'Hutten ran across at least two in Italy, cf. infra, p. 203 et seq.
^Cf. extract in Schard, opus cit., pp. 426-434.

^ Cf, G. B. Adams, History of Civilization during the Middle Ages,
p. 378.

CHAPTER III

The ''Donation" in the Protestant Revolution.
Modern Scientific Historical Criticism

I. Hutten s Publicatioii of Valla s Treatise

The Protestant Revolution gave a new turn to the
discussion. After being discredited by men who, how-
ever hostile they might be to the political pretensions of
the papacy, had no thought of rebellion against the
Church, the ''Donation" was taken up by German revo-
lutionists as proof of the fraud and deceit by wdiich the
papacy had obtained its unrighteous power. Ulrich von
Hutten started the attack by the secret publication in
Germany, in 1517, of Valla's treatise, which up to that
time had remained in manuscript. He affixed to it, with
his characteristic effrontery, a dedicatory letter to Leo
X, full of pretended kindness toward that pope. Hutten
had run across the book in Italy and was quick to see
what an effective w^eapon it was.' After the Protest-

' See the following interesting letter, Hutten's Opera, ed. Becking,
i, p. 142,

"Joannes Cochlaeus Bilibaldo Pirckheimero Bononiae (Bologna),
5 Jul, 1517.

* * * " abiit ad vos ante octiduum noster Huttenus, homo ingenii
magis acuti et acris quam placida et quieti. Dedi ei litteras, quanquam
visus fuerat a nobis nonnihil abalienatus. Amo equidem hominis in-
genium, ferociam ejus non ita; longe certe facilius absentem quam
praesentem (ita tecum loqui libet^ amicum servabo. Pridie quam re-
cederet apud me vidit Laurentii Vallae libellum contra Constantini do-
nationem, quem ego ad modicum tempus videndum ab alio com-
modatum acceperam, vult homo eum libellum in Germania rursus im-
203] 203

204

CONSTAXTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[204

ant movement started, his edition was frequently re-
printed.'

2. Luther s Attitude, Protestant Attack, Catholic Defense

Hutten's publication fell into Luther's hands shortly
after his debate with Eck at Leipsic and added fuel to
the flame of his wrath. He wrote to Spalatin :

have at hand Lorenzo Valla's proof (edited by
Hutten) that the Donation of Constantine is a forgery.
Good heavens ! what darkness and wickedness is at
Rome! You wonder at the judgm.ent of God that such
unauthentic, crass, impudent lies not only lived, but pre-
vailed for so many centuries, that they were incorporated
in the canon law, and (that no degree of horror might
be wanting) that they became as articles of faith. I am
in such a passion that I scarcely doubt that the Pope is

pressioni mandare; petit, ut libellus iste, quia correctior esset, trans-
scriberetur; non potui ei id denegare; transscriptus est a Fridericho
Herbipolensi; transmittetur ei post paucos dies; sed et foris habent ex-
emplaria. Credo equidem verissima esse quae scripsit Laurentius;
vereor tamen ne tuto edi queant. at Huttenus anathema non formidat,
et indignum mihi videtur, ut Veritas a veritatis gladio prohibeatur, facile
igitur illius ausu in lucem Laurentii libertas, qua baud inferiorem
Francus ille gerit, redibit. Scribunt super commenticia ilia donatione
commenta multa canonistae et theologiet cucullati; sed omnium ratiun-
culas, immo captiunculas quisque cui non nihil sit cerebri, facile repel-
leret. At ego contra canonistas loqui non debeo, ne tibi videar rursus
ejus studii apostata; non certe id desero, quanquam magna cum displi-
centia plurima lego, praesertim ea quae sunt in Sexto et Clementinis,
ubi nulla verbositas pontificum avaritiae satisfacere potest."

It will be noticed that Cochlaeus says Hutten wanted " eum libellum
in Germania rursus impressioni mandare." This would seem to imply
that it had already been printed in Italy. I have, however, been unable
to obtain any trace of such an edition in any of the catalogues of incun-
abula or elsewhere, and infer that the above is merely a loose use of
words.

^1518 (?), 1520, 1530, 1618, 1666, i6qo, etc. Cf. Bockiv.g, Huiteni
Opera, i, 18-IQ.

205] ™^ PROTESTANT REVOLUTION 205

Antichrist expected by the world, so closely do their
acts, lives, sayings and laws agree. But more of this
when I see you. If you have not yet seen the book, I
shall take care that you read it."'

This played no small part in the mental process by
which Luther, naturally conservative and submissive to
what he considered to be legitimate authority, came to
look upon the papacy as a usurpation and illegitimate
tyranny, and so passed on into open revolt. Thus, as
the real Constantine had a large share in the develop-
ment of the Catholic Church, the legendary Constantine
contributed to the Protestant movement away from that
church.

The Protestant attack led to a renewed defence of the
Donation; indeed it probably prolonged that defence for
generations after it would otherwise have been abandoned.
Steuchus, librarian of the Vatican, was its ablest champion. *
He made a general defence of the temporal power of the
papacy, smoothed over some of the inconsistencies of the
document in question by doctoring the text, and argued
for the baptism of Constantine by Sylvester. In this
last he made the mistake of assuming that Constantine
would not have presided at the Council of Nicea if he
had not previously been baptized, but he was entirely
right and successful in overthrowing the story of Con-
stantine and Miltiades (Melchiades) upon which Valla
had relied.

^ Feb. 24, 1520. I have given the translation of Preserved Smith ,
Marthi Luther, p. 73. Luther wrote in a similar strain in his Address
to the Christian Nobility of the German Nation of the same year.

*In his Contra Laurentiiini de falsa donatione, 1545, 1547.

2o6

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

3. Baronius

Many dissertations and compilations' were published
in the controversy in the sixteenth century. This phase
of the matter, however, ended with Baronius, the greatest
Catholic church historian of these controversial genera-
tions. In his Annales Ecclesiastici (published 1588- 1607)
written in advocacy of the papacy and the Catholic
Church, he took the position that the falsity of the Do-
nation had been proven and, abandoning its defence, dis-
cussed it as a forgery. ^ Some later Catholic writers
attempted a defence, and occasionally, almost down to
the present, some ill-informed, ill-advised enthusiast has
come forward to use it as genuine, but in educated circles
this became entirely out of the question after Baronius'
great work appeared. This one negative result of his-
torical criticism was thus, in spite of the disturbing influ-
ence of the Protestant conflict, firmly established in the
course of approximately one hundred and fifty years.

The way seemed clear for a dispassionate scientific
study of the origin of the forgery. But Baronius, who
opened the way, also carried over into the later discussion
the point of view of religious controversy. He was the
first to bring into prominence, after the question of
genuineness was settled, the question of the source and
circumstances of the forger}^ itself He seems to have
done it, however, purely as a means of removing re-
sponsibility for the forgery from the papacy. It is inter-

^ The most notable of the latter is that of Simon Schard referred to in
an earlier chapter, Syntagma variorium atitoruni de imperiali juris-
dictione et protestate ecclesiastica, printed also under the title, Syntagma
tractatium de imperiali jurisdictione , authoritate, et praeeminentia,
ac potestate ecclesiastica, etc. Basil, 1566. This contained reprints of
most of the earlier writings attacking the Donation.

'Under the year 324, nos. 117-123. Cf. also A. D. 1191, no 51.

207]

THE PROTESTANT REVOLUTION

207

esting, but natural, that the very historian whose won-
derful erudition and research Protestants criticized for
its lack of command of Greek, should assign the forgery
to just that field about which he knew the least, namely,
writers of the Greek Church.' Starting with his apolo-
getic attitude on behalf of the papacy, and the existence
of Greek texts of the Donation, he advanced the theory
that Greeks had perpetrated the forgery and used it to
establish the antiquity of the See of Constantinople.^
The popes innocently accepted it as genuine and so fell
into the trap of using it. This position is crude and un-
tenable, for aside from other historical impossibilities in-
volved there are numerous indications that the Greek
texts are merely translations from the Latin. ^ But it
represents one of the starting points of the modern sci-
entific inquiry into the source of the Donation. It also
forecast the survival of religious controversy in this
historical question, for down to the present there per-
sists the tendency on the part of many Catholic scholars
to find some scapegoat (nowadays the French forgers of
the ninth century usually play this role), and on the part
of many Protestants to attribute the Donation and its
use altogether too much to continuous, designing
knavery on the part of the papacy.

In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries there were
occasional writings upon the Donation, but these fol-
lowed the lines laid down earlier and are of no particular
interest.

^Loc. cit.

'He accepted the story of Sylvester and Constantine as historical (C/.
A. D. 324, nos. 43-49), including the Roman baptism, most of the
material of the lita or Gesta Sylvestri, and the actual grant of power
and possession to Sylvester, but held that the Greeks had, on the basis
of these historical facts, forged the document of the Donation itself.

' C/. Dollinger, op. cit., pp. 74-78.

2o8 CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY [208

4. Character of Modern Scie^itijic Criticism of the
" Donation "

The great ultramontane controversy of the nineteenth
century, however, culminating at the time of the Vatican
Council, brought again into prominence the medieval
history of the papacy. The Donation of Constantine
was made the subject of more prolonged and micro-
scopic research than any other episode of similar im-
portance in European history. A comparison of this
series of investigation with earlier ones brings out clearly
the vast improvement that had been made in the mean-
time in historical W'Ork. A whole library of lexicons
showing the history of the use of words as well as their
varying meanings, vast compilations of sources of all
sorts and in all languages, accurate and detailed accounts
of the course of events, careful study and comparison of
manuscripts, critical editions of texts, countless organs
of publication through technical reviews and learned
societies, in short, all those products of v\^hat has not
inaptly been termed an industrial revolution" in learned
circles, has put at the disposal of scholars an equipment
with which apparent impossibilities are constantly being-
accomplished.

Moreover, though the old confessional and apologetic
attitude has not entirely disappeared, a new spirit is
clearly visible in the best modern criticism, the spirit of
scientific curiosity, the effort to ascertain and understand
facts, rather than to defend or to discredit existing
institutions. Discussion of the Donation of Constan-
tine now involves the task, beside which earlier efforts
seem puerile, of discovering the process by ^vhich the
story and the document came into being, and the identi-
fication of the place, the time and even the author of the
forgery. The unraveling of the legendary process out

MODERN SCIENTIFIC CRITICISM

209

of which the story of Constantine's leprosy and Roman
baptism developed and the significance of the whole
group of legends about the emperor has been described
above/ The forged document has also become recog-
nized as a composite resultant of ideas and forces lying
deep in the life of the Middle Ages, with a history ob-
scure and difficult, but intensely interesting. The mate-
rials for an understanding of this history are imbedded
in scores and even hundreds of documents surviving
from the eighth and ninth centuries, in peculiarities of
style and vocabulary of various writers, and of various
chancelleries, in political and ecclesiastical crises which
might have spurred men on to the creation of false evi-
dence. The problem has appealed strongly to scientific
curiosity and has occupied the energy of many of the
foremost European historians of the last two generations
in Italy, France and especially Germany. It seems to
have become, like the old scholastic problems, a field of
exercise to sharpen the wits of scholars, deriving im-
portance not from any practical bearing the solution
may have, but from the light it throws upon the pro-
cesses and possibilities of modern historical investiga-
tion.''

5. Conclusions
This work has not resulted in unanimity as to the
place or exact time of the forgery. Differences in the

^Cf. supra, pp. 153-172.

^ For list of the more important writings see Bibliography. For short
summaries see the excellent articles upon Constantine, Donation of, in
the last edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica and the Catholic Cyclo-
pedia. For the most important contributions to the discussion see the
works of Bollinger, Grauert, Langen, Friedrich, Brunner, Zeumer,
Scheffer-Boichorst, Hartmann. The highwater mark was probably
reached about the decade from 1880-1890; since then there has been a
decline, at least in the volume of the discussion.

2IO

CONSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[210

latter extend over a hundred years, 750-850; and both
Italy and France are advanced as the source of the
document.' Substantial arguments are not wanting for
these varying conclusions; the decision, as yet must be
one of probability and not of certainty. The following
results, however, seem to me to best satisfy the require-
ments.

The legend of Constantine's leprosy and cure and of
his rich gifts to the Roman church had been current at
Rome long before the eighth century.'' This legend
seems to have taken on new features from time to time,
chiefly by way of assigning a greater place to the bishop
of Rome, and of attributing greater concessions and
grants to him at the hand of the emperor. ^ Pope Had-
rian I (772-795) undoubtedly was familiar with the
legend in a form which represented Constantine as giv-
ing important privileges and grants to the pope and the
Roman clergy, and endorsed it by his use of it.^

^The theory of a Greek origin was so completely refuted by Bol-
linger, Papstfabeln, etc., p. 74 et seg., that it has been completely
abandoned.

'The researches of Dollinger and Duchesne have thrown abundant
light on this fact. Cf. supra, p.i6s ei seg.

^ Friedrich has attempted to point out definite redactions of the legend
in the sixth and seventh centuries, and has also divided the document
of the Constitutum {or Donatio7i) of Constantine into two parts, the first
dating from 638-641 (after 634, cf. op. cit., p. 53) and the last from 752-
757 (probably just before 754, cf. op. cit., p. no et. seg.). He is not in
my judgment successful in this latter effort, but the larger fact of devi-
ations in the legend in the direction indicated is, I think, established.

^In letters to the eastern rulers, Constantine and Irene, 785 A. D.,
given in Mansi xii, 1056-1076, and to Charlemagne in 775, 776, 778, cf.
Cod. Car., no. Ix; ]2&k, Bibliotheca, iv, 197; Mansi, Concil. Coll., xii,
819. The resemblances between phrases of these letters and texts of
the Donation of Constantine is so close at times as to suggest that
Hadrian used such a text himself. This has been maintained by many
scholars, cf. e. g. Friedrich, op. cit., pp. 2-15, where some of the strik-

2Il]

MODERN SCIENTIFIC CRITICISM

211

The earliest known manuscript of the Constitutum is
the one in Codex Parisiensis Lat. 2778, found in the Col-
lectio Sancti Dionysii of the monastery of St. Denis in
France. ' The collection contains documents dating
from the last years of the eighth century (though it may
have been put together later), antedating the appearance
of the pseudo-Isidorean collection by a generation or
more. All the other early manuscripts including those
of the pseudo-Isidorean Decretals, which brought the
document into general prominence, have been found in
France. French writers, also, were the first to refer to
the Donation. This indicates that its earliest use was
there and has led to the theory that the document was
forged there. The language however so clearly indicates
a Roman source, and historical circumstances point so
strongly in the same direction, that the Frankish origin
seems untenable.

The most exhaustive and exact study of the language
and use of terms in the Constitutum Constanti7tih^s been
made by Scheffer-Boichorst. ^ He has shown a con-
vincing resemblance in ideas, in style, and in vocabulary
to the usage of the papal chancery of Stephen II
(III) (752-757) and Paul I {JS?-?^?), and locates the

ing passages are put in parallel columns. However, it seems only rea-
sonable to suppose that Hadrian would have referred to the document
if he had had it before him in legal form. Other considerations also
point to Hadrian's citing, not the legal document which we have in
the Constitutum Constantini, but the legend in its literary form, prob-
ably in some text which we do not now have. Hadrian's source is
therefore uncertain,

^ For description and discussion of rn^nuscripts, see Zeumer, in Fest-
gabe fur Rudolf vo7i Gneist, pp. 39-47. For Zeumer's edition of the
text of the Constitutum Constantini, cf. infra, pp. 228-237.

^"Neue Forschungen iiber die Konstantinische Schenkung," in
Mittheilungen d, Instituts fUr osterr. Ceschichtsforshung, x (1889), p.
325 et seq.; xi (1890), p. 128 et seq. Also in his Gesammelte Schriften
in the Historische Studie?i of E. Eberling, vol. xlii.

212

COXSTANTINE AND CHRISTIANITY

[212

forgery in the time and in the chancery of the latter
pope. He attributes it not only to the effort to exalt
the authority and prerogatives of the Roman See, but
more particularly to a desire to glorify Sylvester. There
is justification for this on the further ground that Paul
I was especially interested in Sylvester, having founded
a monastery of his name in 761. The glorification of the
saint by a forgery ascribing high place to him would not
be an impossibility at that time. The argument from
the document itself is so strongly in favor of an origin
at Rome and about that time that the substance of the
Donation must be so assigned.

Reasoning from the possible motives of the forger is
uncertain, but must nevertheless be taken into account.
One motive frequently assigned seems clearly a fallacy;
namely, the supposition that the Donation was forged
for use as an inducement for Pippin to make grants
of Italian land to the popes. One can easily ascertain
what inducements the popes actually held out to him
to get help for the papacy. They do not use the name
of Constantine at all ; that would then have had no
appeal for the Franks. They use St. Peter, however,
time and time again. ' Stephen II even wrote a letter
in the name of St. Peter to Pippin urging and command-
ing the Frank to come to the help of Rome. ^ Far from
being produced by the Constitutum Co?istantiniy the
donation of Pippin more likely suggested the later use
of the story of Constantine's gifts to Sylvester as a sup-
port for definite papal claims.

It is entirely probable that the forgery was not per-
petrated for immediate use in support of papal preten-

' Cf. Cod. Carol., nos. 12, 42, 45, 65; see also article by Haller, Die
Karolinger u . d. Papsttum, in Hist. Zeit,, 108, 3-12, i, pp. 39-76.
''Cod. Carol., 10 (A. D. 756), p. 55.

213] MODERN SCIENTIFIC CRITICISM 213

sions over against the Prankish rulers. The foro;-er is very
vague and indefinite as to donations of land, but he makes
sweeping statements concerning the transfer of imperial,
political power in Italy to the papacy, and very definite
statements of the honor and dignity granted to the pope
by the emperor. What is given most explicitly is the
dignity, the aristocratic rank, what we might even call
the social prerogatives, of the Roman bishop and his
clergy, and Constantine's surrender to him of imperial
jurisdiction in the West. These matters were not in-
volved in the relations of the papacy and the Franks.
Moreover it is doubtful whether to Pippin the old
Roman emperors were more than distant names, and
whether an old imperial document would have had any
considerable influence upon him.

On the other hand, the latter half of the eighth cen-
tury was precisely the time when the papacy finally
broke the political ties which bound it to Constanti-
nople. Such assertions as the Donation " makes w^ould
be of great use in vindicating the independent policy of
the papacy in Italy over against the lingering claims of
the eastern emperor. If there was any particular occa-
sion at Rome in the time of Stephen II and Paul I w^hich
called for magnificent assertions of that sort, it has not
as yet come to light. There may \vell have been such
an occasion, but it is not at all necessary to assume it;
the general situation and aspirations of the Roman bishop
and clergy in the troublous times of the eighth century
were occasion enough. The forgery itself did not in-
volve the creation of much new material, it consisted in
throwing into the form of a legal document a current
version of the legend of Constantine's Roman baptism
with current confessions of faith inserted, and adding a
grant by Constantine to Sylvester of imperial rank, of the

214

COXSTAXTINE AND CHRISTIAXITY

[214

imperial crown, of the government of Italy, and of other
social and ecclesiastical perquisites. Indeed, it may be
said to have merely added to the Sylvester legend a
formal confession of the orthodox faith, and a pretended
official, legal grant from Constantine to Sylvester of
prerogatives and a position which the popes had already
begun to hold in central Italy/

The first use made of the document to impress the
Franks and their rulers dates from after the death of
Charlemagne. It may have been cited for the purpose
for which Brunner thinks it was forged, namely, to prove
to Louis the Pious the necessity of receiving the impe-
rial crown at the hands of the pope. There is no direct
proof of this, but the situation was appropriate, and, as
a matter of fact, Louis did repeat the coronation cere-
mony at Rheims in 816, and was crowned this time by
pope Stephen IV. ^ By the middle of the century the

^ It has long been recognized that the " Donation" in granting to
the pope imperial rights over " Rome and all the provinces, places and
states of Italy, and the Western regions," dealt only with Italy, Lom-
bardy, Venetia and Istria, and adjacent islands. In this point it was
merely in line with the requirements of the papal policy, in view of the
danger from the Lombards, etc., that the eastern empire, which could
no longer protect Italy, should not interfere so as to check or humiliate
Rome. It sanctions that policy b}'- showing that Constantine had per-
manently ceded imperial authority in "Italy * * * and the Western
regions" to the popes. This is well brought out by Hartmann,
Geschichte Italiens im Mittelalter, ii, ii (1903), pp. 218-231, et passim,
the best discussion of the " Donation" in its relation to the Italian
situation. Cf. also, Caspar, E., Pippin u. d. romische Kirchs (Berlin,
1914), pp. 185-189.

The rather surprising frequency of Greek MSS. of the " Donation "
and of its use at Constantinople {cf. Dollinger, op. cit., p. 72) seg.
Steuchus said he had seen four Greek MSS. of it in the Vatican Library)
may be an indication of an early attempt to cite it there. If this be so,
there is an interesting analogy between the effort of Baronius and his
successors to prove the Greek origin of the forgery, and the eftort of
Grauert and others recently to prove its Prankish origin.

''Grauert, Die Konstaninische Schenkung," in the Hist. Jahrbuch

MODERN SCIENTIFIC CRITICISM

215

Constitutum Constantini had gained recognition in France
to such an extent as to ensure its circulation and preser-
vation. Its subsequent history has already been told.

des Gdrresgesellschaft in 1882-1884, made a strong argument for the
origin of the document at a date in the eighth century (after 840).
Brunner, in the Fesigabe fur Rudolf von Gneist (1888), pp. 1-35, agreed
with Grauert in fixing a later date than had formerly been common, but
locates the forgery at Rome (instead of in France, as Grauert had
done) and between 813 and 816. Though an earlier date than this
seems called for, the document may have been touched up in one or
two places for the use referred to above.

APPENDIX I

Ti-iE Conversion of Constantine in the Vita Sylvestri

Vita Silvestri, from Boninus Mombritius ; Sanctuarium
seu Vitae sanctorum (Milan, c. 1479), Tom. II, f. 289 et seq.
New ed. duo monachi Solesmenses (Benedictines in France),
(Paris, 1910), II, p. 508 et seq. The text of the following is
based on the 1910 edition, a careful comparison of this edition
with the older one having shown that the editing was carefully
done. Some of the opening sections, and the last parts, are
omitted as not bearing on the subject in hand. Cf. supra, pp.
161-164.

PROLOGVS in VITAM SANCTI SYLVESTRI PAPAE ET CONFESSORIS

Historiograpbus ^ noster Eusebius Caesariae Palestinae urbis
episcopus cum historiam ecclesiasticam scriberet . pretermisit
ea : quae in aliis opusculis sunt : uel quae se meminit retu-
lisse : Nam uiginti libros idest duas decadas omnium pene
prouinciarum passiones martyrum et episcoporum et con-
fessorum et sacrarum uirginum ac mulierum continere fecit .
Deinde secutus et ab apostolo Petro omnium episcoporum
nomina et gesta conscripsit : et earum urbium : quae arcem
pontificatus per apostolicas sedes tenere noscuntur : ut urbs
Roma . Antiochia . hyerosolima . Ephesus et Alexandria .
Harum urbium episcoporum omnium praeteritorum nomina
usque ad tempus suum at gesta graeco sermone conscripsit :
Ex quo numero unum episcoporum urbis Romae sanctum Syl-
uestrum me de graeco in latinum transferre praecepisti domine
sancte ac beatissime pater . Quia itaque exiguum me ad trans-
lationem banc esse consydero : elegi hoc detergere : quod sim
parui sermonis et inertis ingenii : Vnde obsecro : ut pro me
tuis orationibus impetres : ne qui culpam contemptoris fugio :
praesumptoris noxam incurram : sed tuis orationibus ueniam
me consequi non dubito . Credo enim quod orando impleri
facias : quod me arripere iubendo fecisti .

1 Word misspelled in original.
217] 217

2l8

APPENDIX

[218

Syluester urbis Romae episcopus cum infantulus esset a
uidua matre lusta nomine et opere traditus est ut erudiretur
a Cyrino presbytero : cui quottidie sedulum exhibebat offi-
cium : Eius autem uitam imitatus et mores : ad summum api-
cem christianae religionis attigit ^

In illo tempore exiit edictum : ut christiani ad sacrificandum
idolis cogerentur : unde factum est ut secedens ab urbe sanctus
Syluester Sirapti latibulo cum suis se clericis collocaret . Con-
stantinus autem Augustus monarchiam tenens cum plurimas
strages de christianis dedisset : et innumerabilem populum per
omnes prouincias fecisset uariis poenarum generibus inter-
fici : elefantiae a deo lepra in toto corpore percussus est . Huic
cum diuersa magorum et medicorum agmina subuenire non
potuissent : pontifices capitolii hoc dederunt consilium : de-
bere piscinam fieri in ipso capitolio : quae puerorum sanguine
repleretur : in quam calido ac fumante sanguine nudus de-
scendens Augustus mox posset a uulnere illius leprae mundari .
Missum est igitur et de rebus fisci uel patrimonii regis ad tria
millia ; et eo amplius adducti ad urbem Romam pontificibus
traditi sunt Capitolii , Die autem constituto egrediente im-
peratore Constantino palatium ad hoc eunti ad capitollium : ut
sanguis innoxius funderetur : occurrit multitudo mulierum :
quae omnes resolutis crinibus nudatisque pectoribus dantes
hululatus et mugitus coram eo se in plateis fundentes lachry-
mas strauerunt . Percunctatus itaque Constantinus Augustus
qua de causa multitudo haec mulierum ista faceret : didicit has
matres esse filiorum eorum : quorum effundendus erat san-
guis : tandiu quousque piscina repleretur : in qua medendi
causa lauandus descenderet et sanandus . Tunc imperator ex-
horruit facinus : et se tantorum criminum reum fore apud
deum existimans : quantorum esset numerus puerorum : uicit
crudelitatem pontificum pietas romani imperii : et prorum-
pens in lachrymis iussit stare carrucam : et erigens se ac conu-
ocans uniuersos clara uoce dixit : audite me comites et com-
militones et omnes populi : qui astatis : romani imperii digni-

1 The other opening sections are omitted as not bearing upon the
subject in hand.

219] APPENDIX 219

tas de fonte nascitur pictatis . Cur ergo praeponam salutem
meam saluti populi innocentis ? Nunc autem ab effusione in-
noxii sanguinis sententiam crudelitatis excludam . Melius est
enim pro salute innocentum mori : quam per interitum eorum
uitam recuperare crudelem : quam tamen recuperare incertum
est : cum certum sit recuperata crudelitas . Sic semper contra
hostes nostra certamina in praeliis extitisse noscuntur : ut
reus esset legibus et capitali sententiae subderetur : quicum-
que aliquem occidisset infantem : Eratque hoc statutum in
bello : ut facies ilia quam pubertas adhuc non nouerat gla-
dium euaderet bellatoris : et uita incolumis permaneret . Nunc
itaque quod in hostium filiis custoditum est : in filiis nostro-
rum ciuium exercebimus ? ut simus nostris legibus rei atque
captiuitate animae et conscientiae captiuabimur : qui pug-
nando fideliter omnium gentium meruimus esse uictores ? Quid
iuuat barbaros superasse : si a crudelitate uincamur ? Nam
uicisse extraneas nationes bello uirtus est populorum : uincere
autem uicia peccata et crimina uirtus est morum . In illis ergo
preliis extitimus fortiores illis : In his autem nobis ipsis for-
tiores sumus : cum uincimus nosmetipsos : dum mala uota
nostra excludimus : et quod inconsulte desyderamus : con-
suite et utiliter exercemus . hoc autem facimus : quando uolun-
tatibus deorum uoluntates nostras postponimus : et diuinis
desyderiis obedientes nostra desyderia impugnamus : et in hoc
certamine uictos nos esse hac ratione gaudemus : ut agnos-
camus nos contra salutem nostram uoluisse pugnare . Nam
qui conatur perpetrare : quod malum est : captiuare utique
studet bonitatem . Cum ergo isto fuerit certamine superatus :
uictoriam obtinet uictus : quoniam uictor perditionem inuen-
erat : et malam captiuitatem incurrerat post triumphum : si
tamen triumphus dici potest : quando pietas ab impietate uin-
citur : et iusticia ab iniusticia superatur . Vincat ergo nos
pietas in isto congressu . Vere enim omnium aduersantium
poterimus esse uictores : si a sola pietate uincamur . Omnium
et enim uerum se esse dominum comprobat : qui uerum se
seruum ostenderit esse pietatis . Cum ad istam conctionem
omnis exercitus omnisque populus diutissime acclamasset :

220

APPENDIX

[220

Itemque conctionatus dixit : lussit pietas romana filios suis
matribus reddi : ut dulcedo reddita filiorum amaritudinem
lachrimarum maternarum obdulcet . Et haec dicens iter quod
arripuerat eundi ad capitolium deserens : ad palatium rediit .
Non solum autem filios reddidit : uerum etiam dona simul am-
plissima et uehicula infinita et annonas iussit expendi : ut quae
flaentes uenerant et lugentes : ad patriam alienam : alacres
cum gaudio ad ciuitates suas reuerterentur .

Hac igiter transacta die nocturno regis facto silentio : somni
tempus aduenit : Et ecce adsunt apostoli sancti Petrus cum
Paulo dicentes : Nos sumus Petrus et Paulus : quoniam
flagitiis termimun posuisti : et sanguinis innocentis efifussi-
onem horruisti : missi sumus a Christo lesu domino nostro
dare tibi sanitatis recuperandae consilium . Audi ergo monita
nostra : et omnia fac quaecumque tibi indicamus . Syluester
episcopus ciuitatis Romae ad montem Sirapti persecutiones
tuas fugiens in cauernis petrarum cum suis clericis latebram
fouet . Hunc cum ad te adduxeris : ipse tibi piscinam pietatis
ostendet : in quam dum te tertio merserit : omnis te ista de-
seret leprae ualitudo : quod dum factum fuerit : banc uicissi-
tudinem tuo saluatori compensa : ut omnes iussione tua per
totum orbem romanorum ecclesiae restaurentur . tu autem te
ipsum in h?c parte purifica : ut relicta omni idolorum super-
stitione deum unum qui uerus et solus est deus adores et ex-
colas : et ad eius uoluntatem attingas . Exurgens igitur a
somno Constantinus Augustus statim conuocans eos qui ob-
seruabant palatium : et secundum tenorem somni sui misit ad
montem Sirapti : ubi sanctus Syluester in cuiusdam christiani
agro persecutionis causa cum suis clericis receptus lectionibus
et orationibus insistebat : At ubi se a militibus conuentum
uidit : credidit ad martyrii coronam se uocari : et conuersus
ad clerum omnibus qui cum eo erant dixit : ecce nunc tempus
acceptabile : ecce nunc dies salutis : aduenit tempus quo nos
lectio docuit operum nostrorum assignare fructum . Ecce domi-
nus iterum spiritaliter inter homines ambulat : si quis uult

^ The paragraphing is mine. Note how closely this section is copied
in the C onstitutum C onstantini, cf. infra, pp. 230-231.

APPENDIX

221

post eum uenire : abneget semetipsum sibi : et toUat crucem
suam : et sequatur eum : Ut haec dicens orationem fecit omne-
que mysterium adimpleuit commendans animam suam et dans
pacem omnibus profectus est . Secuti sunt autem eum uniuersi
clerici cum presbyteris triginta et diaconibus quinque optantes
passioni simul succumbere : melius arbitrantes cum illo pro
Christo mori quam in eius absentia epulari : erat enim tran-
quillo semper animo et sereno : ita omnes clericos diligens : et
sicut gallina puUos suos euocans : ut circa uniuersos carum
amorem ostenderet : et omni hora eos monitis caelestibus eru-
diret . Vnde factum est : ut omnes eruditionis sagena refecti
passionem magis diligerent quam timerent : et simul cum eo
alacres properarent . Profectus itaque ut dictum est : peruenit
ad regem . Tunc illico assurgens augustus prior eum salutauit
dicens : Bene uenisse te gratulamur : Cui sanctus Syluester
respondit : pax tibi et uictoria de caelo subministretur : quern
cum rex alacri animo et uultu placidissimo suscepisset : omnia
illi quae ei facta quaeque reuelata sunt secundum textum su-
perius compraehensum exposuit . Post finem uero narrationis
suae percunctabatur qui isti essent dii Petrus et Paulus : qui
ilium uisitassent : et ob quam causam salutis suae latebram
detexissent . Cui sanctus Syluester respondit : deus unus
est : quem colimus : qui totum mundum fecit ex nihilo idest
caelum et terram et omnia quae in eis sunt . Petrus autem
et Paulus dii non sunt sed serui dei : qui illi per fidem pla-
centes hoc consecuti sunt : ut arcem teneant sanctitatis : et
sic in numero sanctorum omnium primi a deo apostoli facti
sunt . Ergo ipsi primi diuinitatem domini nostri lesu christi
filii dei gentibus praedicauerunt : et omnis ecclesia ab ipsis
initium sumpsit . Hi expleto apostolatus officio ad palmam
martyrii peruenerunt : et sunt modo amici omnipotentis dei .
Cum haec et his similia gratanter augustus audisset : dixit :
peto utrum hos istos apostolos habet aliqua imago expressos :
ut in ipsis liniamentis possim agnoscere hos esse : quos me
reuelatio docuisset : qui mihi dixerunt se a deo missos esse .
Tunc sanctus Syluester iussit diacono suo ut imaginem aposto-
lorum exhiberet : quam imperator aspiciens cum ingenti cla-

222

APPENDIX

{222

more coepit dicere : nihil inferius hac imagine in eorum ef-
figie quorum uultus in uisione conspexi . Hi ergo mihi dixe-
runt : mitte ad Syluestrum episcopum : et hie tibi ostendet
piscinam pietatis : in qua cum lotus fueris : omnium conse-
queris tuorum uulnerum sanitatem . Cui sanctus Syluester re-
spondit : Audi me rex : et salutis piscinam necessarian! hoc
ordine require : ut primum credas Christum filium dei ideo
de caelo uenisse : et inter homines conuersatum esse : ut istam
piscinam credentibus in se manifestaret : Cui Augustus re-
spondit : ego nisi credidissem : ad te poenitus non misissem .
Tunc sanctus Syluester dixit : exige a te ipso una hebdomade
ieiunium : et deposita purpura intra cubiculum tuum : ibique
induere ueste humili : prosterne cylicium : et confitere modo
per ignorantiam erroris factum : ut christianis persecutionem
induceres : et ipsum esse saluatorem corporum et animarum
non solum loquendo sed et credendo pronuncia : et poenitere
multos sanctos dei occidisse : et in hac hebdomade templa iube
claudi : et cessare omnia sacrificia idolorum : debitores fisco
pauperes laxa : carceratos dimitti praecipe : in exiliis et metal-
lis aut in quibuscumque tribulationibus constitutis indulgen-
tiam dari constitue . lube per totam hebdomada eleimosynas
fieri : beneficia etiam postulantibus exhiberi praecipe : et
idoneos qui haec exequantur constitue . Tunc Constantinus
imperator dixit : constat omnes culturas homines in supersti-
tione diligere : nec posse ibi diuinitatis gloriam inueniri ubi
mendax assertio deum dicit hunc esse quem fecit . Nisi inuisi-
bilis iste est : qui inuocatus aquis hanc uirtutem concedit : ut
peccata animarum abluat : et corporibus conferat medicinam :
constat hunc esse uerum deum : cuius apostoli me uisitare dig-
nati sunt : et hoc monere : ut unum deum credam saluatorem
meum . Cum haec et his similia Constantinus Augustus diceret
: imposuit sanctus Syluester manus super caput eius : et bene-
dicens eum : ac faciens cathecuniinum abiit . Post haec sanc-
tus Syluester conuocatis omnibus presbyteris ac diaconibus
cum uniuerso clero indixit ieiunium biduanum omni ecclesiae
dicens : Si Nineuitae in praedicatione lonae per triduanum
ieiunium iram dei et offensam pro mentis debitam euase-

223]

APPENDIX

223

runt : quanto magis nos in praedicatione domini nostri lesu
christi persecutiones euadimus . lucramur animas pacem dei
ecclesiis acquirimus : et idolatriis finem imponimus : hoc autem
facimus si ieiuniis et orationibus hoc a domino impetremus .
Factum est unanimiter ieiunanitibus cum ornamento orationis
idest die sexta et sabbato in quo claudendum erat ieiunium
uespertino tempore dixit Constantino regi Syluester episcopus
: audi me rex : piscina ergo haec omnis aqua quae est sub
caelo siue maris siue fluminum sine fontium sine paludum siue
stagnorum : tanta uirtus est nominis Christi : ut ad inuoca-
tionem eius peccata uniuersa abluat : et salutem conferat :
quam fides credentis exposcit . Vocansque ipsum secum Au-
gustum ieiunantem monitisque instruens constantia erigens :
fide certissimum reddens : Vespere itaque sabbati iubet laua-
crum caloris sui in palatio lateranensi augustum ingredi : quo
ingresso ipse ad benedictionem fontis accedit . Benedicto ita-
que fonte Augustus introgreditur : quem Syluester episcopus
suscipiens interrogat : si ex toto corde credit in patrem et
fihum et spiritumsanctum : qui cum credere se clara uoce
diceret : et pompis se diaboli renunciare toto corde assereret :
mersit confitentis x\ugusti in piscina totum corpus : atque
sancto superfundens chrismate dixit : qui mundasti in lordane
lepram Naaman Syri : et caeci nati oculos per aquam aper-
uisti : et Paulo apostolo per baptismum oculos quos amiserat
reddidisti : et fecisti nobis ex persecutore doctorem : tu
emunda hunc seruum tuum omnium terrenorum principem
Constantinum . Et sicut animam eius ab omni stercorae peccati
mundasti : ita corpus eius ab omni hac lepra elephantiae ablue :
ut ex persequente credentem et defendentem se habere uirum
hunc sancta tua ecclesia glorietur per dominum nostrum lesum
christum filium tuum : qui tecum uiuit et regnat in unitate
spiritussancti in saecula saeculorum : Cumque omnes respon-
dissent : amen : Subito quasi fulgur lux intolerabilis per me-
diam fere horam emicuit : quae omnium et mentes exterruit :
et aspectus obtexit : et ecce sonus in aqua quasi sartaginis stri-
dentis exortus ueluti piscium ingentium Christus totam illam
piscinam fontis repletam ostendit . Ex qua mundus surgens

224

APPENDIX

[224

Constantinus imperator Christum se uidisse confessus est . Et
indutus uestibus candidis prima die baptismatis sui banc legem
dedit : Christum deum esse uerum : qui se mundasset a leprae
periculo : et hunc debere coli ab omni orbe romano . Secunda
die dedit legem ut qui Christum blasphemasse probatus fuerit
puniretur . Tertia die promulgauit legem : ut si quis christiano
fecisset iniuriam : omnium bonorum suorum facultatem dimi-
diam amitteret . Quarta die priuilegium ecclesiae romanae
pontificique contulit : ut in toto orbe romano sacerdotes ita
hunc caput habeant : sicut omnes indices regem . Quinta die
in quocumque loco fuerit fabricata ecclesia consecrationis suae
banc uirtutem obtineat : ut quicunque reus ad eam confu-
gerit : a iudicis periculo qui in praesenti fuerit defensetur .
Sexta die dedit legem : nulli intra muros cuiuscumque ciui-
tatis dari licentiam ecclesiam construendi : nisi ex consensu
praesentis episcopi : quem sedes apostolica probasset antisti-
tem . Septima die omnium possessionum regalium decimas
manu iudiciaria exigi ad aedificationem ecclesiarum . Octaua
die processit albis depositis totus mundus et saluus : et ueniens
ad confessionem apostoli Petri ablato diademate capitis totum
se planum proiiciens in faciem tantam illic lachrymarum ef-
fudit multitudinem : ut omnia ilia insignia uestimenta pur-
purea infunderentur : Dans uocem inter amaras lachrymas
quibus se errasse : se pecasse : se reum esse de presecutione
sanctorum commemorans : et ob hoc non se esse dignum eius
limina contingere : Cumque ingenti gemitu haec exclamaret :
quantus ibi ab omni populo lachrimarum fusus est numerus :
quis memorare sufficiat ? Erat autem tale gaudium flaetibus
plenum : quale solet esse in caris mortuis suscitatis aut in his :
qui euaserunt naufragia : aut in his qui uicinos dentes euadere
potuerunt.

Verum quoniam de his longum est enarrare : dicamus
quid prima die processionis suae egit : Exuens se chlamy-
dem et accipiens bidentem : terram primus aperuit ad funda-
mentum basilicae construendum . Dehinc in numero duodecim
apostolorum duodecim cophinos plenos suis humeris super-
positos baiulauit de eodem loco : ubi fundamentum basilicae

APPENDIX

225

apostolis debuerat funclare : et ita gaudens et exultans in car-
ruca sua una cum papa residens ad palatium rediit . Altera
uero die similiter intra palatium suum lateranensem basilicae
fabricam coepit : dans talem legem : quae in his uerbis conclu-
ditur . Sit omnibus notum : ita nos Christi cultores effectos :
ut intra palatium nostrum templum eius nomini construamus :
in quo populus christianus una nobiscum conueniens deitati eius
gratias referamus . Hac itaque lege data constituit atque edicto
pendente proponi iussit : ut si quis pauper christianus fieri
uoluisset de facultatibus regiis uestimenta Candida et uiginti
solidos de archa regis acciperet . Hoc autem factum est : ne
cupiditas imperaret fallaciam : et non credentibus sed temp-
tantibus istis donis proficeret . Tanta autem eo anno credidit
multitude : ut uirorum numerus baptizatorum ad duodecim
millia tenderetur excepta mulierum populositate et infantium .
Sic quoque ex uno latere crescebat dei populus in gloria : ut
ex altero paganis confusio nasceretur . Igitur cum et senatorum
caterua huic relligioni sanctae fidem nuUus adhiberet : nec ob
hoc irasci alicui . Augustum papa permitteret : praecepit Au-
gustus sibi in basilicam excelsum tribunal statui : et senatum
ac populum romanum hac uoce affatus est : profanae dissen-
siones mentium ideo nulla ratione salubre consilium sumunt :
quia profunda ignorantiae circundantur caligine : et nuUus eas
clarus ac serenus ueritatis splendor illuminat . Aperiendi sunt
ergo lumine scientiae oculi animorum et diligenti est examina-
tione cernendum : istos deos nec dici debere : nec credi : qui
ab hominibus facti noscuntur . Non enim dii sunt : sed homi-
nes magis ipsi eorum dii dici possunt : quos ipsi plasmauerunt .
Denique si quid aliquo casu in his laesum fuerit : homines qui
sua eos arte fecerunt : sua eos nihilominus arte restaurant .
Sunt ergo homines : ut dixi : dii eorum qui dum non essent
eos fecerunt : et dum fecissent : laesi ab eis restaurantur .
Vnde coniecturam summens mecuni omnibus ad culturam ueri
dei exhibeo : quod in me quoque factum aspicitis ipsi et pro-
batis : Nisi enim ipse esset deus Christus : qui me fecit : non
utique quod ab alio factum fuerat restaurare ualuisset . Pro-
batur ergo humanum genus huius dei esse figmentum : qui

226

APPENDIX

[226

restaurat lapsum : fractum solidat sublimat allisum . Sicut
uniuersa ista idola quae hominum figmenta sunt : ideo homi-
num auxilio cum laesa fuerint reparantur . Habeant itaque
habeant iam finem isti errores . abdicetur ista superstitio :
quam ignorantia concepit : stulticia nutriuit : et aluit . Adore-
tur deus solus : qui unus et uerus regnat in caelis . Desinamus
hos colere : a quibus saluari non possumus : et quos laesos ipsi
saluamus . Cessemus ab eis flagitare nostri custodiam : quos
nostri custodia tuemur ne pereant . Quid miserius quam aes
lapidesque adorare et ferrum ? Sit itaque omnibus gratum :
quod sum a Christo quem negabam pristinae redditus sanitati :
et ab isto errore ipso domino lesu christo auxiliante cessamus .
Et quoniam sapientia romanorum non fallitur : istum deum
excolat : a quo ipsa custodiatur : non quem ipsa custodiat .
Verum ne longa oratio omnes uos intentos extendat : quid
constituendum censui breuiter pandam : Patere uolumus chris-
tianis ecclesias : ut priuilegia quae sacerdotes templorum ha-
bere noscuntur : antistites christianae legis assumant . Vt
autem notum sit uniuerso orbi romano uero deo et domino lesu
christo nos inclinare ceruices : intra palatium meum ecclesiam
Christo arripui construendam : ut uniuersitas hominum com-
probet : nulla dubietatis in corde meo uel praeteriti erroris re-
manisse uestigia : Cumque in isto uerbo fuisset eloquium :
uox populorum per tria horarum spatia haec sunt : qui Chris-
tum negant male depereant : quia ipse est uerus deus . Dictum
est tricies . Item unus deus christianorum . Dictum est quad-
ragies . Item templa claudantur : et ecclesiae pateant . Dictum
est decies . Item qui Christum non colunt : inimici Augustorum
sunt . Dictum est quadragies . Item qui saluauit Augustum :
Ipse est uerus deus . Dictum est tricies . Item qui Christum
non colunt : hostes romanorum sunt . Dictum est decies . Item
qui Christum colit : semper uicit : Dictum est quadragies .
Item sacerdotes templorum ab urbe pellantur . Dictum est quad-
ragies . Item qui adhuc sacrificant diis : ab urbe pellantur .
Dictum est terdecies . Item iube : ut hodie repellantur . Dictum
est quadragies . Ad banc uocem Imperator silentium petiit :
quo facto sic allocutus est populum : Inter diuina humanaque

227] APPENDIX 227

seruitia hoc interest : ut humana seruitia coacta sint : diuina
autem uoluntaria comprobentur . Deus enim quia mente coli-
tur : et sincero hominis ueneratur affectu : spontanea eius
debet esse cultura . In hoc enim apparet : quia uerus deus est :
quod per tanta saecula contemptoribus suis non iratus finem
imposuit : sed propitium se esse qui coli debeat demonstrauit
indulgendo crimina : et salutem animabus et corporibus con-
ferendo . Sit ergo omnibus notum : non necessitate coactos :
sed suo iudicio hberos posse fieri christianos nec humanum
metuentes imperium ad dei culturam accedere ahquos opor-
tere : sed rationabih consyderatione magis rogare : uti chris-
tianorum numero appHcentur ab iis : q'ui huic sacratissimae
legi deseruiunt . lustum et enim uerumque conspicimus : ut
sicut petentibus culpa est : si negetur : ita non petentibus si
tradatur iniquum . Nec hoc aliqui metuant : quod a nostra
gratia diuellantur : si christiani esse noluerint . nostra enim
claementia talis est : ut opere non mutetur . Vnde hoc consy-
derandum est : quod magis nobis adhaerebunt in amiciciis ii :
qui spontanee ad christianam legem uenire uoluerint . Tunc
omnibus populis et christianis et paganis banc legem laudan-
tibus : et uitam Augusto optantibus iteratus clamor populi
factus est diutissimus . Et cum finis huius rei factus fuisset :
reuerteni Augusto ad palatium tota ciuitas cereis lampadibus-
que repleta coronata est : erat enim omnibus gaudium : quo-
niam lex talis processerat : quae nullum ad culturam impell-
eret : nullum a Christi cultura repelleret . Fit uox laeticiae per
uniuersas ecclesias . honorantur uniuersa sepulchra sanc-
torum : omnesque contessores qui cathenati ad diuersa fuer-
ant exilia tracti : cum gloria et honore regio ad patrias pro-
prias reuocati amici effecti sunt regis . Caetera quae facta
sunt uel dicta praetero : ne pro ipsa prol3^xitate fastidium
lector incurrat : sunt enim alia plura et utiliora : quae prae-
terire non debeo . Exigit enim haec historia : ut ad Helenam
imperatoris matrem flectam articulum : et hoc ordine ad finem
huius operis attingam.^

^ Then follows a long account of the conversion of Helena through
a disputation between Sylvester and Jewish rabbis, which forms a
regular element in the oriental form of the Sylvester legend, cf. supra,
pp. 163-164.

228

APPENDIX

[228

Earliest Text of the Constitutum Constantini, or
Donation of Constatine ^

EXEMPLAR CONSTITVTI DOMNI CONSTANTINI IMPERATORIS

[Reprinted from edition by Karl Zeumer, in Festgahe fiir
Rudolf von Gneist (Julius Springer, Berlin, 1888, 8 marks),
pp. 47-59, by permission of the publishers.]

In nomine sanctae et individuae Trinitatis, Patris scilicet et
Filii et Spiritus sancti. Imperator Caesar Flavius Constan-
tinus in Christo Jesu, uno ex eadem sancta Trinitate salvatore
domino Deo nostro, fidelis, mansuetus, maximus, beneficus,
Alamannicus, Gothicus, Sarmaticus, Germanicus, Brittannicus,
Hunicus, pius, felix, victor ac triumphator, semper augustus,
sanctissimo ac beatissimo patri patrum Silvestrio, urbis Romae
episcopo et pape, atque omnibus eius successoribus, qui in
sede beati Petri usque in finem saeculi sessuri sunt, pontificibus,
nec non et omnibus reverentissimis et Deo amabilibus catholicis
episcopis, eidem sacrosanctae Romanae ecclesiae per hanc
nostram imperialem constitutionem subiectis in universo orbe
terrarum, nunc et in posteris cunctis retro temporibus con-
stitutis, gratia, pax, caritas, gaudium, longanimitas, miseri-
cordia, a Deo patre omnipotente et Jesu Christo filio eius et
Spiritu sancto cum omnibus vobis.

Ea quae salvator et redemptor noster dominus Jesus
Christus, altissimi Patris filius, per suos sanctos apostolos
Petrum et Paulum, interveniente patre nostro Silvestrio summo
pontifice et universali papa, mirabiliter operari dignatus est,
liquida enarratione per huius nostrae imperialis institutionis
paginam ad agnitionem omnium populorum in universo orbe
terrarum nostra studuit propagare mansuetissima serenitas.
Primum quidem fidem nostram, quam a prelato beatissimo
patre et oratore nostro Silvestrio universali pontifice edocti

1 Cf. supra, pp. 175-177.

229]

APPENDIX

229

sumus, intima cordis confessione ad instruendas omnium ves-
trum mentes proferentes et ita demum misericordiam Dei super
nos diffusam adnuntiantes.

3. Nosse enim vos volumus, sicut per anteriorem nostram
sacram pragmaticam iussionem significavimus, nos a culturis
idolorum, simulacris mutis et surdis manufactis, diabolicis com-
positionibus atque ab omnibus Satanae pompis recessisse et ad
integram Christianorum fidem, quae est vera lux et vita per-
petua, pervenisse, credentes, iuxta id quod nos isdem almificus
summus pater et doctor noster Silvester instruit pontifex, in
Deum patrem, omnipotentem factorem caeli et terrae, visi-
bilium omnium et invisibilium, et in Jesum Christum, filium

eius unicum, dominum Deum nostrum, per quem creata sunt • ^
omnia, et in Spiritum sanctum, dominum et vivificatorem uni-
versae creaturae. Hos Patrem et Filium et Spiritum sanctum
confitemur, ita ut in Trinitate perfecta et plenitudo sit divini-
tatis et unitas potestatis. Pater Deus, Filius Deus et Spiritus
sanctus Deus, et tres unum sunt in Jesu Christo.

4. Tres itaque formae, sed una potestas. Nam sapiens retro
semper Deus edidit ex se, per quod semper erant gignenda
secula, verbum, et quando eodem solo suae sapientiae verbo
universam ex nihilo formavit creaturam, cum eo erat, cuncta
suo arcano componens mysterio. Igitur perfectis caelorum
virtutibus et universis terrae materiis, pio sapientiae suae nutu
ad imaginem et similitudinem suam primum de limo terrae
fingens hominem, hunc in paradyso posuit voluptatis ; quem
antiquus serpens et hostis invidens, diabolus, per amarissimum
ligni vetiti gustum exulem ab eisdem efficit gaudiis, eoque
expulso, non desinit sua venenosa multis modis protelare
iacula, ut a via veritatis humanum abstrahens genus idolorum
culturae, videlicet creaturae et non creatori deservire suadeat,
quatenus per hos eos, quos suis valuerit inretire insidiis secum
aeterno efficiat concremandos supplicio. Sed Deus noster,
misertus plasmae suae, dirigens sanctos suos prophetas, per
quos lumen futurae vitae, adventum videlicet filii sui, domini
Dei et salvatoris nostri Jesu Christi, adnuntians, misit eundem
unigenitum suum filium et sapientiae verbum. Qui descendens

230 APPENDIX [-230

de celis propter nostram salutem natus de Spiritu sancto et
Maria virgine, verbum caro factum est et habitavit in nobis.
Non amisit, quod fuerat, sed coepit esse, quod non erat, Deum
perfectum et hominem perfectum, ut Deus mirabilia perficiens,
ut homo humanas passiones sustinens. Ita verum hominem
et verum Deum, predicante patre nostro Silvestrio sunimo
pontifice, intelHgimus, ut verum Deum verum hominem fuisse
nullo modo ambigamus ; electisque duodecim apostoHs, mira-
culis coram eis et inumerabilis populi multitudine choruscavit.
Confitemur eundem dominum Jesum Christum adimplesse
legem et prophetas, passum, crucifixum, secundum scripturas
tertia die a mortuis resurrexisse, adsum.ptum in ceHs atque
sedentem ad dexteram Patris, inde venturum iudicare vivos
et mortuos, cuius regni non erit finis.

5. Haec est enim fides nostra orthodoxa a beatissimo patre
nostro Silvestrio summo pontifice nobis prolata; exhortantes
idcirco omnem populum et diversas gentium nationes hanc
fidem tenere, colere ac predicare et in sanctae Trinitatis
nomine baptismi gratiam consequi et dominum Jesum Chris-
tum salvatorem nostrum, qui cum Patre et Spiritu sancto per
infinita vivit et regnat saecula, quem Silvester, beatissimus
pater noster universalis predicat pontifex, corde devoto
adorare.

6. Ipse enim dominus Deus noster, misertus mihi peccatori,
misit sanctos suos apostolos ad visitandum nos, et lumen sui
splendoris infulsit nobis et abstracto a tenebris ad veram lucem
et agnitionem veritatis me pervenisse gratulamini. Nam dum
valida squaloris lepra totam mei corporis invasisset carnem.
et multorum medicorum convenientium cura adhiberetur, nec
unius quidem promerui saluti, ad haec advenerunt sacerdotes
Capitolii, dicentes mihi debere fieri fontem in Capitolio et
complere hunc innocentium infantium sanguine et calente in eo
loto me posse mundari. Et secundum eorum dicta aggre-
gatis plurimis innocentibus infantibus, dum vellent sacrilegi
paganorum sacerdotes eos mactari et ex eorum sanguine
fontem repleri, cernens serenitas nostra lacrimas matrum
eorum, ilico exhorrui facinus, misertusque eis, proprios illis

231] APPENDIX 231

restitui precipimus filios suos, datisque vehiculis et donis
concessis, gaudentes ad propria relaxavimus.

7. ^ Eadem igitur transacta die, nocturna nobis facta silentia,
dum somni tempus advenisset, adsunt apostoli, sanctus Petrus
et Paulus, dicentes mihi : ' Quoniam flagitiis posuisti terminum
et effusionem sanguinis innocentis orruisti, missi sumus a
Christo domino Deo nostro, dare tibi sanitatis recuperande
consilium. Audi ergo monita nostra et fac quodcumque indi-
camus tibi. Silvester episcopus civitatis Romae ad montem
Seraptem persecutiones tuas fugiens in cavernis petrarum cum
suis clericis latebram fovet. Hunc cum ad te adduxeris, ipse
tibi piscinam pietatis ostendet, in qua dum te tertio merserit,
omnis te valitudo ista deseret leprae. Quod dum factum
fuerit, banc vicissitudinem tuo salvatori conpensa, ut omnes
iussu tuo per totum orbem ecclesiae restaurentur, te autem
ipsum in hac parte purifica, ut, relicta omni superstitione
idolorum, Deum vivum et verum, qui solus est et verus, adores
et excolas, ut ad eius voluntatem adtingas.'

8. Exsurgens igitur a somno protinus iuxta id, quod a
Sanctis apostolis ammonitus sum, peregi, advocatoque eodem
precipuo et almifico patre et inluminatore nostro Silvestrio
universali papa, omnia a Sanctis apostolis mihi precepta edixi
verba, percunctatique eum sumus, qui isti dii essent: Petrus
et Paulus? Ille vero, non eos decs vere dici, sed apostolos
salvatoris nostri domini Dei Jesu Christi. Et rursum interro-
gare coepimus eundem beatissimum papam, utrum istorum
apostolorum imaginem expressam haberet, ut ex pictura dis-
ceremus hos esse, quos revelatio docuerat. Tunc isdem vener-
abilis pater imagines eorundem apostolorum per diaconem
suum exhiberi precepit, quas dum aspicerem et eorum, quos
in somno videram figuratos in ipsis imaginibus cognovissem
vultus, ingenti clamore coram omnibus satrapibus meis con-
fessus sum, eos esse, quos in somno videram.

9. Ad haec beatissimus isdem Silvester pater noster, urbis
Romae episcopus, indixit nobis penitentiae tempus intro

1 The almost exact copying of this paragraph from the correspond-
ing section of the Vita Silvestri is noteworthy. Cf. supra, p. 220.

232 APPENDIX [232

palatium nostrum Lateranense in uno cilicio, ut omnia, quae
a nobis impie peracta atque iniuste disposita fuerant, vigiliis,
ieiuniis atque lacrimis et orationibus apud dominum Deum
nostrum Jesum Christum salvatorem impetraremus. Deinde
per manus impositionem clericorum usque ad ipsum presulem
veni, ibique abrenuntians Satanae pompis et operibus eius vel
universis idolis manufactis, credere me in Deum patrem, omni-
potentem factorem caeli et terrae, visibilium et invisibilium, et
in Jesum Christum fiHum eius unicum, dominum nostrum, qui
natus est de Spiritu sancto et Maria virgine, spontanea volun-
tate coram omni populo professus sum, benedictoque fonte
illic me trina mersione unda salutis purificavit. Ibi enim,
me posito fontis gremio, manu de 'caelo me contingente propriis
vidi ocuHs, de qua mundus exsurgens, ab omni me leprae
squalore mundatum agnoscite. Levatoque me de venerabili
fonte, indutus vestibus candidis, septemformis sancti Spiritus
in me consignatione adhibuit beati chrismatis unctionem et
vexillum sanctae crucis in mea fronte linivit dicens : ' Signat
te Deus sigillo fidei suae in nomine Patris et Fihi et Spiritus
sancti in consignatione fidei '. Cunctus clerus respondit :
'Amen '. Adiecit presul : ' Pax tibi
10. Prima itaque die post perceptum sacri baptismatis mysterium
et post curationem corporis mei a leprae squalore agnovi, non
esse alium Deum nisi Patrem et Filium et Spiritum sanctum,
quem beatissimus Silvester papa predicat, trinitatem in unitate,
unitatem in trinitate. Nam omnes dii gentium, quos usque
actenus colui, demonia, opera hominum manu facta conpro-
bantur, etenim quantam potestatem isdem Salvator noster suo
apostolo beato Petro contulerit in caelo ac terra lucidissime
nobis isdem venerabilis pater edixit, dum fidelem eum in sua
interrogatione inveniens ait : ' Tu es Petrus, et super hanc
petram aedificabo ecclesiam meam, et porte inferi non pre-
valebunt adversus eam '". Advertite potentes et aurem cordis
intendite, quid bonus magister et dominus suo discipulo
adiunxit inquiens : ' et tibi dabo claves regni caelorum ; quod-
cumque ligaveris super terram, erit ligatum et in caelis, et
quodcumque solveris super terram, erit solutum et in caelis/

APPENDIX 233

Mirum est hoc valde et gloriosum in terra ligare et solvere, et
in caelo ligatum et solutum esse.

Et dum hec predicante beato Silvestrio agnoscerem et bene-
ficiis ipsius beati Petri integre me sanitati comperi restitutum,
utile iudicavimus una cum omnibus nostris satrapibus et uni-
verso senatu, optimatibus etiam et cuncto populo Romano,
gloriae imperii nostri subiacenti, ut, sicut in terris vicarius filii
Dei esse videtur constitutus, etiam et pontifices, qui ipsius
principis apostolorum gerunt vices, principatus potestatem
amplius, quam terrena imperialis nostrae serenitatis mansue-
tudo habere videtur concessam, a nobis nostroque imperio ob-
tineant ; eligentes nobis ipsum principem apostolorum vel eius
vicarios firmos apud Deum adesse patronos. Et sicut nostra
est terrena imperalis potentia, eius sacrosanctam Romanam
ecclesiam decrevimus veneranter honorare, et amplius quam
nostrum imperium et terrenum thronum sedem sacratissimam
beati Petri gloriose exaltari, tribuentes ei potestatem et gloriae
dignitatem atque vigorem et honorificentiam imperialem.

Atque decernentes sancimus, ut principatum teneat, tam
super quattuor precipuas sedes Antiochenam, Alexandrinam,
Constantinopolitanam et Hierosolimitanam, quamque etiam
super omnes universo orbe terrarum Dei ecclesias ; et ponti-
fex, qui pro tempore ipsius sacrosanctae Romanae ecclesiae
extiterit, celsior et princeps cunctis sacerdotibus totius mundi
exsistat, et eius iudicio, quaeque ad cultum Dei vel fidei Chris-
tianorum stabilitate procuranda fuerint, disponantur. Justum
quippe est, ut ibi lex sancta caput teneat principatus, ubi sanc-
tarum legum institutor, Salvator noster, beatum Petrum apos-
tolatus obtinere precepit cathedram, ubi et crucis patibulum
sustenens beate mortis sumpsit poculum suique magistri et
domini imitator apparuit, et ibi gentes pro Christi nominis con-
fessione colla flectant, ubi eorum doctor beatus Paulus apos-
tolus pro Christo extenso collo martyrio coronatus est ; illic
usque in finem quaerant doctorem, ubi sanctum doctoris quies-
cit corpus, et ibi proni ac humiliati caelestis regis, Dei salva-
toris nostri Jesus Christi, famulentur officio, ubi superbi terreni
regis serviebant imperio.

233]

234 APPENDIX ' [234

Interea nosse volumus omnem populum universarum gen-
tium ac nationum per totum orbem terrarum, construxisse nos
intro palatium nostrum Lateranense eidem salvatori nostro
domino Deo Jesu Christo ecclesiam a fundamentis cum bap-
tisterio, et duodecim nos sciatis de eius fundamentis secundum
numerum duodecim apostolorum cofinos terra onustatos pro-
priis asportasse humeris ; quam sacrosanctam ecclesiam caput
et verticem omnium ecclesiarum in universo orbe terrarum
dici, coli, venerari ac predicari sancimus, sicut per alia nostra
imperialia decreta statuimus. Construximus itaque et ec-
clesias beatorum Petri et Pauli, principum apostolorum, quas
auro et argento locupletavimus, ubi et sacratissima eorum cor-
pora cum magno honore recondentes, thecas ipsorum ex elec-
tro, cui nulla fortitudo prevalet elementorum, construximus et
crucem ex auro purissimo et gemmis preciosis per singulas
eorum thecas posuimus et clavis aureis confiximus, quibus pro
concinnatione luminariorum possessionum predia contulimus,
et rebus diversis eas ditavimus, et per nostras imperialiiim
iussionum sacras tam in oriente quam in occidente vel etiam
septentrionali et meridiana plaga, videlicet in Judea, Grecia,
Asia, Thracia, Africa et Italia vel diversis insulis nostram
largitatem eis concessimus, ea prorsus ratione, ut per manus
beatissimi patris nostri Silvestrii pontificis successorumque
eius omnia disponantur.

Gaudeat enim una nobiscum omnis populus et gentium
nationes in universo orbe terrarum ; exortantes omnes, ut Deo
nostro et salvatori Jesu Christo immensas una nobiscum re-
feratis grates, quoniam ipse Deus in caelis desuper et in terra
deorsum, qui nos per suos sanctos visitans apostolos sanctum
baptismatis sacramentum percipere et corporis sanitatem
dignos efficit. Pro quo concedimus ipsis Sanctis apostolis,
dominis meis, beatissimis Petro et Paulo et per eos etiam beato
Silvestrio patri nostro, summo pontifici et universali urbis
Romae papae, et omnibus eius successoribus pontificibus, qui
usque in finem mundi in sede beati Petri erunt sessuri, atque
de presenti contradimus palatium imperii nostri Lateranense,
quod omnibus in toto orbe terrarum prefertur atque precellet

235] APPENDIX 235

palatiis, deinde diadema videlicet coronam capitis nostri simul-
que frigium nec non et superhumeralem, videlicet lorum, qui
imperiale circumdare adsolet collum, verum etiam et clamidem
purpuream atque tunicam coccineam et omnia imperialia in-
dumenta seu et dignitatem imperialium presedentium equitum,
conferentes etiam et imperialia sceptra, simulque et conta atque
signa, banda etiam et diversa ornamenta imperialia et omnem
processionem imperialis culminis et gloriam potestatis nostrae.

15- Viris enim reverentissimis, clericis diversis ordinibus eidem
sacrosanctae Romanae ecclesiae servientibus illud culmen,
singularitatem, potentiam et precellentiam habere sancimus,
cuius amplissimus noster senatus videtur gloria adornari, id
est patricios atque consules efficii, nec non et ceteris dignitati-
bus imperialibus eos promulgantes decorari ; et sicut imperialis
militia, ita et clerum sacrosanctae Romanae ecclesiae ornari
decernimus; et quemadmodum imperialis potentia officiis
diversis, cubiculariorum nempe et ostiariorum atque omnium
excubiorum ornatu, ita et sanctam Romanam ecclesiam de-
corari volumus; et ut amplissime pontificalis decus prefulgeat,
decernimus et hoc, ut clerici eiusdem sanctae Romanae ec-
clesiae mappulis ex lenteaminibus, id est candidissimo colore,
eorum decorari equos et ita equitari, et sicut noster senatus
calciamenta uti cum udonibus, id est candido linteamine in-
lustrari: ut sicut celestia ita et terrena ad laudem Dei de-
corentur ; pre omnibus autem licentiam tribuentes ipso sanctis-
simo patri nostro Silvestrio, urbis Romae episcopo et papae,
et omnibus, qui post eum in successum et perpetuis tempori-
bus advenerint, beatissimis pontificibus, pro honore et gloria
Christi Dei nostri in eadem magna Dei catholica et apos-
tolica ecclesia ex nostra synclitu, quem placatus proprio con-
silio clericare voluerit et in numero religiosorum clericorum
connumerare, nullum ex omnibus presumentem superbe agere.

16. Decrevimus itaque et hoc, ut isdem venerabilis pater noster
Silvester, summus pontifex, vel omnes eius successores ponti-
fices diadema, videlicet coronam, quam ex capiti nostro illi
concessimus, ex auro purissimo et gemmis pretiosis uti de-
beant et eorum capite ad laudem Dei pro honore beati Petri

236 APPENDIX [236

gestare ; ipse vero sanctissimus papa super coronam clericatus,
quam gerit ad gloriam beati Petri, omnino ipsa ex auro non
est passus uti corona, frygium vero candido nitore splendidam
resurrectionem dominicam designans eius sacratissimo vertici
manibus nostris posuimus, et tenentes frenum equi ipsius pro
reverentia beati Petri stratoris officium illi exhibuimus;
statuentes, eundem frygium omnes eius successores pontifices
singulariter uti in processionibus.

17. Ad imitationem imperii nostri, unde ut non pontificalis apex
vilescat, sed magis amplius quam terreni imperii dignitas et
gloriae potentia decoretur, ecce tarn palatium nostrum, ut
prelatum est, quamque Romae urbis et omnes Italiae seu occi-
dentalium regionum provintias, loca et civitates sepefato
J^eatissimo pontifici, patri nostro Silvestrio, universali papae,
contradentes atque relinquentes eius vel successorum ipsius
pontificum potestati et ditioni firma imperiali censura per hanc
nostram divalem sacram et pragmaticam constitutum decerni-
mus disponendam atque iure sanctae Romanae ecclesiae con-
cedimus permanendam.

18. Unde congruum prospeximus, nostrum imperium et regni
potestatem orientalibus transferri ac transmutari regionibus
et in Byzantiae provintia in optimo loco nomini nostro civita-
tem aedificari et nostrum illic constitui imperium; quoniam,
ubi principatus sacerdotum et Christianae religionis caput ab
imperatore celeste constitutum est, justum non est, ut illic
imperator terrenus habeat potestatem.

19. Hec vero omnia, que per hanc nostram imperialem sacram
et per alia divalia decreta statuimus atque confirmavimus,
usque in finem mundi inlibata et inconcussa permanenda de-
cernimus ; unde coram Deo vivo, qui nos regnare precepit et
coram terribili eius iudicio obtestamus per hoc nostrum im-
perialem constitutum omnes nostros successores imperatores
vel cunctos optimates, satrapes etiam, amplissimum senatum
et universum populum in toto orbe terrarum, nunc et in pos-
terum cunctis retro temporibus imperio nostro subiacenti, nuUi
eorum quoquo modo licere, hec, que a nobis imperiali sanctione
sacrosanctae Romanae ecclesiae vel eius omnibus pontificibus

APPENDIX 237

concessa sunt, refragare aut confringere vel in quoquam con-
velli. Si quis autem, quod non credimus, in hoc temerator
aut contemptor extiterit, aeternis condemnationibus subiaceat
innodatus, et sanctos Dei principes apostolorum Petrum et
Paulum sibi in presenti et futura vita sentiat contrarios, atque
in inferno inferior! concrematus, cum diabolo et omnibus
deficiat impiis.

Huius vero imperialis decreti nostri paginam propriis mani-
bus roborantes super venerandum corpus beati Petri, principis
apostolorum, posuimus, ibique eidem Dei apostolo spondentes,
nos cuncta inviolabiliter conservare et nostris successoribus
imperatoribus conservanda in mandatis relinqui, beatissimo
patri nostro Silvestrio summo pontifici et universali papae
eiusque per eum cunctis successoribus pontificibus, domino
Deo et salvatore nostro Jesu Christo annuente, tradidimus
perenniter atque feliciter possidendam.

Et subscriptio imperialis :

t Divinitas vos conservet per multos annos, sanctissimi et
beatissimi patres.

Datum Roma sub die tercio Kalendarum Apriliarum, domno
nostro Flavio Constantino augusto quater et Galligano viris
clarissimis consulibus.

237]

238 APPENDIX [238

III

Nicholas of Cues (Cusanus) on the Donation of
constantine

De concordantia catholica, lib. Ill, cap. ii ^

"ONum praeterire nequeo, quoniam pene omnium sententia
indubitata est, Constantinum Imperatorem, occidentis im-
perium Romano pontifici Silvestro, ac ejus in aevum succes-
soribus perpetuo dono tradidisse; et ideo etiam si ratio de
unitate principantis, scilicet adversari bono et recto ordini,
V duo capita fore non concluderet, pateret tamen in Occidente

Imperatorem nullum nisi a papa dependenter imperium cog-
nosceret, juste esse posse. Hanc radicem quoadpotui investi-
gavi, praesupponens hoc etiam indubitatum esse, Constantinum
talem donationem f acere potuisse : quae tamen quaestio nec
soluta est hactenus, nec solvetur verisimiliter uncquam.

Sed in veritate supra modum admiror, si res ita est, eo quod
in autenticis libris et in historiis approbatis non invenitur.
Relegi omnia quae potui gesta imperialia ac Romanorum pon-
tificum, historias sancti Hieronymi, qui ad cuncta colligendum
diligentissimus fuit, Augustini, Ambrosii, ac aliorum opuscula
peritissimorum, revolvi gesta sacrorum conciliorum quae post
Nicenum fuere: et nullam invenio concordantiam ad ea, quae
de ilia donatione leguntur. Sanctus Damasus papa ad in-
stantiam beati Hieronymi, actus et gesta praedecessorum dici-
tur annotasse, in cujus opere de Sylvestro papa non ea in-
veniuntur quae vulgo dicuntur. Legitur in certis historiis Con-
stantinum a Silvestro baptizatum, et ipsum imperatorem tres
illas, sancti Joannis, sanctorum Petri et Pauli ecclesias miri-
fice ornasse, ac annuos multos redditus e diversis massis ter-
rarum in diversis provinciis et insulis pro continuando ornatu
lampadarum balsami et nardipistici, ac caeterorum, donasse,
de quibus omnibus particularem mentionem in pcntificum libro

1 Reprinted from the 1520 edition of the works of Nicholas Cusanus
with a few changes in the interest of modernization. Cf. supra,
pp. 188-191.

239]

APPENDIX

239

reperies. Sed de donatione temporalis dominii, aut imperii
Occidentis, nihil ibi penitus continetur.

Verum quid postquam Astulfus rex Longobardorum ex-
archatum Ravennatem occupavit, cum aliis multis locis, et
Stephanus secundus natione Romanus ex patre Constantino,
multis legatis ad Astulfum missis rogaret imperiali ditioni
loca restitui, et facere non vellet Astulfus, Stephanus Pip-
pinum adiens, eum cum duobus filiis in reges unxit. Fuit
etiam cum eodem Stephano orator missus Imperatoris, et a
Pippino impetrarunt, ut Astulfum induceret, quod imperio
loca restitueret. Misit Pippinus, nec profecit. Unde cum
non posset sic ab Astulfo restitutionem impetrare, promisit
Stephano se vi ablaturum ab eo, et sancto Petro daturum.
Hoc audito revertitur imperialis missus. Pippinus, quae
promiserat explevit. Forma vero hujus donationis in gestis
praefati Stephani cum nominatione particulari omnium
bonorum continetur. Zacharias papa monarchiam regni
Franciae in Pippinum transtulit, Ludovico rege deposito, de
quo legitur, XV q. VI, alius, et in gloss, venerabifem. Ex illo
puto Pippinum sedi apostolicae favisse. Post hoc Desiderius
rex iterum illas civitates aut earum aliquas, tempore Adriani
sexti coepit. Adrianus papa multis missis ad eum legatis,
repetiit jus sancti Petri, impetrare non potuit. Tunc Carolus
magnus invocatus per Adrianum, recuperavit, et iterum dona-
vit sancto Petro solenni donatione, quae in gestis ejusdem
Adriani papae continentur. Ex istis constat Constantinum
imperium per exarchatum Ravennatem, urbem Romam, et
Occidentem minime papae dedisse.

Unde continue legitur, Imperatores usque ad tempora prae-
fata sicut prius pleno jure Romam, Ravennam, et Marchiam
cum aliis locis possedisse. Et probat textus XCVI, distin.
" bene quidam," ubi dicit de Patricio praefecto nomine Adoa-
cris regis ; et LXIII, distin. ''Agatho " ; XCVI, distin. cum
ad verum," cum similibus. Et Romanos pontifices leginius
Imperatores sateri dominos. Scribit enim Agatho papa ad
Imperatorem Constantinum, qui sextam Synodum congrega-
vit, et multis annis secutus est prinium, quomodo urbs Roma

240

APPENDIX

[240

sit ipsius Imperatoris servilis urbs. Et Bonifacius papa ad
Honorium, qui dicit, quod ecclesiae Romanae ipse habet
regere sacerdotium, sed Imperator humanas res, et in fine
dicit Romam esse urbem suae mansuetudinis ; hie textus habe-
tur XCI distin. ecclesiae.'' Et ut breviter dicam, nullibi con-
trarium legi quin usque ad ilia praefata Pippini tempora Im-
perator remanserit in possessione locorum praetactorum. Nec
unquam legi aliquem Romanorum pontificum usque ad tempora
Stephani secundi, in illis locis nomine sancti Petri aliquid
juris praesumpsisse habere.

Haec credo vera esse, non obstante famigera opinione de
contrario, quae in palea habetur Constantinus, XCVI distin.
quoniam absque dubio, si non fuisset illud dictamen apro-
cryphum, Gratianus in veteribus codicibus, et canonum collec-
tionibus invenisset, et quia non invenit, non posuit. Unde
quae postea addidit, pro palea ita illam confictam scripturam
posuit, sicut multa alia inveniuntur ex apocryphis libris nos-
tris inscripta. Ego etiam ad longum hanc scripturam in
quodam libro inveni, quae multo plus continet, quam ea quae
in decreto ponitur loco praeallegato, et diligenter earn exami-
nans reperi ex ipsamet scriptura, argumenta manifesta con-
fictionis et falsitatis, quae pro nunc longum et inutile foret his
inserere. Etiam est advertendum, quod textus Constantinus,
XCVI distin. est ex legenda sancti Silvestri extractus, et f undat
ille qui imposuit decreto, autoritatem ipsius textus in appro-
batione Gelasii in Synodo. Rogo videatur XV disin. sancta
Romana " ilia approbatio, et inveniet pauci roboris, quia dicit
auctorem ignorari, et tamen per catholicos legi, et ea propter
legi posse, qualis sit approbatio, quisque considerare potest.
Multae enim sunt historiae sancti Silvestri; una in quo hoc
non invenitur, quam sanctus Damasus ponit, alia cujus auctor
ignoratur, quam textus non dicit veram sed legi posse, neque
dicit in ilia hoc contineri. Etiam antiqua decreta non habent
textum, nisi usque ad ver. " Item decreta Romanorum ponti-
ficum " inclusive, et sic non invenitur in illis libris iste ver. de
historia Silvestri. Quinta etiam universalis Synodus, quae de
approbatis doctorum omnium, et scripturarum approbatarum

241]

APPENDIX

241

libris mentionem facit, ac etiam ipsa synodus Martini papae,
quae fuit contra afferentes unam voluntatem in Christo, sci-
licet contra Petrum et Sergium, renovans approbatas scrip-
turas, ut egomet vidi, nullam de istis historiis faciunt men-
tionem, nec quisquam approbatus aut nominatus inter veri-
dicos, quem unquam vidi.

Ego legi in Vicentio historiarum, XXIIII libro, in fine,
secundum sanctum Hieronymum, Constantinum uxorem Faus-
tam, et filium Crispum crudeliter occidisse, et in extremo
vitae ab Eusebio Nicomediae episcopo baptizatum, in Arianam
liaeresim declinasse. A quo tempore, inquit Hieronymus,
ecclesiarum rapinae, et totius orbis discordia secuta est usque
in praesens tempus. Ista libro de actibus Silvestri, quem Vin-
centius dicit a quondam cujus nomen ignorat e Graeco trans-
latum, ut eodem libro cap. IX habetur, manifeste contradi-
cunt. Quis non crederet potius Hieronymo approbate, quam
ignoti auctoris scripturis, quae apocryphae dicuntur, quando
auctor ignoratur?

Textus etiam qui asscribitur Melchiadi papae, qui habetur
XII q. i. futuram, qui videtur huic dicto aliquantulum obstare,
non est Melchiadis papae secundum glossam quandam, et etiam
rei veritatem, quia Melchiades praecessit Silvestrum, ut patet
in catalogo Romanorum pontificum. Et si Constantinus fuit
baptizatus a Silvestro secundum commune dictum, tunc patet
titulum illius textus falsum, quia loquitur de baptismo Con-
stantini. Et etiam si Melchiadis foret ille textus, adhuc non
haberetur argumentum ex eo contra praemissa, quia non dicit
aliud quam Constantinum sedem Romanam imperialem reli-
quisse, et Petro et successoribus consessisse. Hoc est, quod
ubi fuit sedes imperialis, quod ibi sit modo papalis, quod non
negatur. Et verum est Constantinum imperatorem tempore
Melchiadis papae fuisse, et tunc Christianum, ut per Augus-
tinum in multis locis hoc habetur, et maxime in epistola ad
Glorium et Elusium, et quibus hoc gratum est, quae incipit,

Dixit quidem apostolos," et hoc concordat cum Hieronymo.

Vidi etiam decretum Leonis papae in synodo Romana cum
subscriptione episcoporum et clericorum et civium Roman-

242 APPENDIX [242

orum, ubi Leo papa Othoni primo restituit omnia loca per
Pippinum et Carolum et Robertum reges sancto Petro data.
Et nominantur in eodem decreto omnia loca, et nuUam facit
de donatione Constantini mentionem ^

Sunt meo judicio ilia de Constantino apocrypha, sicut for-
tassis etiam quaedam alia longa et magna scripta Sanctis
Clementi et Anacleto papae attributa, in quibus volentes Ro-
manam sede omni laude dignam, plus quam ecclesiae sanctae
expedit et exaltare, se penitus aut quasi fundant

Sicut nec de Constantini donatione se majorem arguere
deberet, quae si etiam indubia foret, quid in spirituali cathedra
potestatis ecclesiasticae augere possit, quisque intelligit. Non
adhuc dubitaretur de ejus validitate solum quae diligenti in-
^fcquisitione, quam pro veritate scienda reperire potui scribo,
"salvo in omnibus judicio sacrae Synodi. Et si omnia ilia quae
praenarrata sunt, ex acceptatione ecclesiae firma censeri de-
bent, placet et mihi, quia etiam illis omnibus scripturis e medio
sublatis, sanctam Romanam ecclesiam primam, summae potes-
tatis, excellentiae, inter cunctas sedes quisque catholicus
fateretur.

1 The two following paragraphs on this page I have taken from
the reprint in Schard, op. cit.

'V,

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INDEX

Names of modern writers are
writings by italics.

Abgar legend, 156-157

Acts of Syhester, cf. Vita Silvestri

Addai (Thaddeus), 116, 156

Addai, Doctrine of, 116

Ado of Vienne, 178

Adulter}', legislation on. 44

Aeneas Sylvius, 199, 200

Aldhelm, 150

Alexander VI, 201

Alfonso of Aragon and Naples, 193

Ambrose of Milan, 153. 169

x\mmianus Marcellinus, 63, 89, 123

Anastasia, 74

Anselm of Lucca, 178

Antioch, Church at, 57

Antoninus of Florence, 201

Anulinus, Rescript to, 30. 31

Apollo, cf., also. Sun-worship, 76, 85

Apotheosis of Emperors, 47, 61

Arch of Constantine, 47-52

Arian controversy, 70-71, 82

Ariosto, 202

Arius, 70, 71

Aries. Synod of. 69

Armenia, 157, I58n

Artemiiis, Life of St., 140

Athanasius, 71

Augustine, 141

Balsamon. 179

Baptism of Constantine. cf.. Con-
stantine
Baronius, 170. 206-207
Basle, Council of, 189 et seq.
Bernard, St., 187
Bethlehem, Church at, 57
Bishops, Judicial Powers of. 41
Blastares, 179
BoissiER, 22
Boniface III, 180
Boniface VIII, 178
Bonizo, 171

Bordeaux Pilgrim, 57n, 120
255]

indicated by small caps, titles of

Brieger, 21
Brei iary, The, 172
: Brunner, 214

i BURCKHARDT. 20, 45. 65

: Bury, 66

; Caecilian, Bp. of Carthage. 63n.4. 69
Caesars, The, 124
Cathalanus. 200
Celibacy of the Clergy. 32
Charlemagne, 200
Children, Legislation on, 43-44
Christianity, Adoption of. 9. 17

et seq., 37 et seq., S3-86, 9^-99.

IQ2 et seq., 123
Christianity, and Paganism. 82 et

seq., 95-96
Church, Privileges of, 32 et passim
Church Property, 30
Claudius, Emperor, 113
Claudius. Legend of Constantine's

Descent from, 105, 112 et seq.
Clerg}-. Privileges of, 31-32, 40
Codex Theodosianus, cf. Theo-

dosian Code
Codinus, 129

Coinage, cf., Constantine
Concubinage. Legislation on. 44

I Constance. Council of. 188

' Constans, Emperor, 37
Constantia. 60, 114

, Constantine, the Great

I Baptism, 87-89,95. 159, 160. 171 ;

I Career, 10, 112; Church build-

I ing. 56-61, 147-148, 163; Coinage.
45-47: Donation of, r/. Constitu-
tion Constantini; Conversion, 72-
82. 106, 125-128, 133-135 et seq.,
141, 152 et seq.] "Edict to the

: Inhabitants of the Proznnce of
Palestine," 39. no; "Edict to the
People . . . the Error of Poly-
theism,'" 39; Influence of, 9 et seq..

256

17-19. 103; As Legend-maker,
105-107, 139-140; Legendary
Leprosy, 153-155, 162 et passim;
Legislation, 25-45; Literature on,
19-23; Miraculous Aid, 131 et
seq.; Miraculous Visions, 77-79,
109, 136 et seq.; Moral Character,
89-94, 142; Motives and Disposi-
tion, 17, 68, 71, 78, 80-81, 86-87,
108; Oration to the Saints (the
Easter Sermon), no; Piety, 141
et seq.; Religious Position, 54-55)
146 et passim
Constantinople, 57-58, 148 et seq.,
176

Constantius, Father of Constantine
the Great, 73-74, 114, 120

Constantius, Son of Constantine the
Great, 91

V Constitution Constantini, 12-13, 168,
175-183, 194-195, 209 et seq.
Constitutum Sylvestri, 166-167
Cortesi, 201

Crispus, 77-91-92, III, 127-128, 130
Crivelluci, 27-28, 109
Cross, The, 80

" Cross, Legend of the True ", 60,

116 et seq., 159
CuMONT, 83-84
Cusanus, 189 et seq.
Cyril of Jerusalem, 120

Dante, 179, I93
Decretum Gelasii, 165
Dessau, 114

Deusdedit, Cardinal, 178
Diocletian, 61, ico-ioi, 112, 115
Diocletian Persecution, 66
Dionysius Exiguus, 165
Divination, cf. Magic
DoLGER, F. J., 23

Donation of Constantine, cf. Con-
stitutum Constantini
Donatist schism, 58, 68-69
Donato, Girolamo, 201
Duchesne, 22, in, 154, I55n, 158
DuRUY, 21

Easter, 70-82

Easter Sermon, cf. Constantine,

Oration of
Edict of Milan, cf. Milan
Edict to the People . . . the Error

of Polytheism, cf. Constantine

[256

Edict to the Inhabitants of the Pro-
vince of Palestine, cf. Constantine

Ekkehard, 171

Episcopal Courts, 41

Equitius, Church of, 60

Erasmus, 192

Eugenius III, 178

Eugenius IV, 194, 198

Eumenius, 42-43, 74-76, loi, 113

Eunapius, 65, 123, 128

Eusebius of Caesarea, 27-29. 38, 53,
62-63, 71-74, 106, 107-112, 133, 135,
142, 162, 167, 195-196

Church History, 54, in

Life of Constantine, 38-39, 54,

88, 107 et seq., in, 142, 144-145

Oration in Praise of Constan-
tine, 86, 107 et seq., 126, 139, 142

Eusebius of Nicomedia, 62, 153,
159-160, 171

Eusebius of Rome, 119, 152-153,

159, 171
Eutropius, 89, 114, 123
Evagrius, 129, 143

Farfa, Monastery of, 186

Fausta, 58, 91-92, ni, 127, 128, 130

Fetichism, 79

Forgery, 13, 102, no-iii, 168, 175,

211 et seq.
Fredegar, 169
Frederic I, 186
Frehulf, 169
Frothingham, a. L., 49

Galerius, Edijct of, 27

Gaza, 53

Geffcken, 23

Ge.asii, Decretum, 165

Gelasius of Cyzicus, 153

Gesta Liberii, 166, 171

Gesta Silvestri, cf. Vita Silvestri

Gibbon, Edward, 20, 120, 140

Gladiatorial Exhibitions, 43

Glycas, 65

Gorres, Franz, 22, 27-28, no
Gottfried of Bamberg, 187
Gratian, 178
Gregory the Great, 167
Gregory VII, 178, 181
Gregory IX, 178, 180
Gregory the Illuminator, 157
Grisar, 22

Hadrian I, 210

INDEX

2S7] i^^'i

Hadrian IV, 178

Haruspices, 35, 76

Healing, Miraculous, 96

Helena, 112, 116 et seq., 121, 152,

163-164
Heliopolis, Church at, 57
Hereditary Succession, 115
Heretical Sects, 32, 40
Hermann the Lame, 169
Heydenreich, 121-122
Hincmar, 178

Hispellum, Inscription at, 52

Historia Tripartita, 169, 185

Historical Writing among the Ro-
mans, 100 et seq.

Historical Criticism, Modern, 208
et seq.

HoDGKiN, E. M., 13, 180

Hosius, 62, 128

HiiLLE, Hermann, 28-29

Hugo of Fleury, 178

Hutten, Ulrich von, 199, 20? et seq.

Immorality, legislation on, 44

Innocent III, 178, 180-181

Innocent IV, 178

Inscriptions, 45-47, 47-52

Isapostolos, 143

Isidore, 169

Isidorean Decretals, cf. Pseiido-

Isidorean
Ivo of Chartres, 178

Jacob of Sarug, cf. James
James of Sarug, 154 et seq., 158
Jerome, 38, 88n.2, 141, 143, 169, 185,

191, 195
Jerusalem., churches at, 57
Jews, 32. 44-45. 163
John XXII, 178
Judas Cyriac, 118
Julian, Emperor, 66, 89, 90, 114,

123-127
Justin Martyr, 34

Kanonaris, 65
Keim, Theodor, 20

Labarum, 47, 6, 77-81, 106-107, 134
Lactantius, 27, 29, 53-54, 62, 73n4,

77 et seq., 84, 138
Laetus, Pomponius, 199
Lateran church, 58-59, 160, 176
Laws. cf. Constantine, legislation

tx 257

Legends, cause and significance, 9-

12, 99 et sea.
Leo IX, 178 '
Leopold of Bebenburg, 187
Leprosy, 165, cf. also Cou tantine
Libanius, 38, 123

Liber PontiiicaUs, 59, 119, 147, 160
Licinius, 26, 27, 37, 55, 81, 91-92, I33
Life of Constantine cf. Eusebius

of Caesarea
Louis the Pious, 200, 214
Luther, 204-205

Magic, cf. also Divination, 35-36
Mamre, Church at, 57
Man so, no

Manumission of Slaves, Z'^-ZZ
Marianus Scotus, 169
]Marquardt, 21
Marsiglio of Padua, 187
Maxentius, 72, 76-81, 112, 132 et

passim
Maximian, 114
Melchiades, cf. Miltiades
MiGNE, 170

Milan, Edict, or Rescript of, 19,
26-30

Miltiades, Bishop of Rome, 58, 69,

162, 195-196, 205
Milvian Bridge, Battle of, 77-79
Minervina, 91
Miraculous Cures, 96n.i
Mithraism, 33. 34. 85
Mombritius (Mombrizio), i6n., 166
Mom M SEN. no

Monogram of Christ, cf. also La-
barum, 47, 61, 77-81, 137-141
Monotheism, Roman, 30, 51, 76, 82,

94, 96

Moses of Chorene, 55, 158-159
Mount of Olives, 57

Nazarius, 56, 74, 76, loi, 132-133
Nicea, first Council of, 63, 70, 81,

103, no, III
Nicea, second Council of,, 169
Nicholas of Cues (Cusa), cf.

Cusanus
Nicholas III, 178
Nicholas V, 198
Nicomedia, Church at, 57
Niebuhr, 20
Notitia, 59

INDEX

[258

Olympiodorus, 128
Oration of Constantine, cf. Con-
stantine

Oration in Praise of Constantine,

cf. Eusebius
Otto III, 185

Paganism, 26, 37 et seq., 45, 63-67,

73-7^, 82, 94, 95-96
Panegyrists, 66, 74, 76, loi, 108,

131, 142
Paul I, 211, 212, 213
Pecock, Reginald, 199-200
Peter Damiani, 178
Peter, H., 10 i, 109
Philostorgius. 140, 143, 150
Piccolomini, cf. Aeneas Sylvius
Picernus, Bartholemeus, 201
Pippin, 200, 212
Pius II, cf. Aeneas Sylvius
Pontifex Maximus, 46, 67
Poggio, 197
Porcaro, 199

Praxagoras Atheniensis, 123
Prosper, 169
Protonice, 116-117
Pseudo-Isidorean Decretals, 178, 211

Quarto Incoronati, Church of, 170

Religious Toleration and Liberty,
30-31

Rome, Churches at, 58-61
Rossi, DE, 49
Rufinus, 153, 196

St. Denis, Monastery of, 211
Santa Croce in Gerusalemme,

Church of, 59-60
Scarampo, Cardinal, 197
Schiller, Hermann, 21, 47

SCKEFFER-BOICHORST, 12-13, 211 et

seq.

SCHULTZE, v., 22, 38, 53, IIO

Schwartz, Ed., 23, 67-68, 94
Scriptores Historiae Augustae, 100,
123

Seeck, O., 19, 22, 26, 27, 67-68, 78,

no, 112, IT4, ii5n.2
Sepulchre, Church of the, 57

Sesan, v., 28

Slavery, cf. also Manumission, 32,
43

Socrates, 143

Soothsayers, cf. Haruspices

Sopater, 65, 128, 129

Soracte, Mt., 162, 170

Sozomen, 129, 135, 143, 149

Statues, Equestrian, 144

Stephen II, 211, 212, 213

Stephen IV, 214

Steuchus, 205

Suidas, 65

Sun-worship, 33

Sunday, 32-35

Symmachus, Pope, 165

Sylvester, Bishop of Rome, cf, also
Vita Silvestri, 119, 1 50-151, 153,
155, 159, 161 et seq., 170, 176

Sylvester II, 185

Syraptim (Syraptis), cf. also
Soracte, 162, 170

Temples, Pagan, 39, 63-64

Tertullian, 34

Thaddeus, cf. Addai

Theodoret, 139, i43, i45, 152

Theodosian Code, 57

Trdat (Tiridates), 157

Twelve Apostles, Church of the, 57

Urban II, 178

Valens, 65

Valla, Lorenzo, 13, 191 ct seq.
Victor, Sextus Aurelius. 90. 123
Vita Silvestri, cf. also Sylvester,
118, 159, 161 et seq., 165-168, 196
Vitteleschi, Cardinal, 194
Voragine, 120

Walther von der Vogelweide, 180
Wetzel, 186-187

Wills in favor of the Church, 32
WiTTiG, J., 29
Wzrol, Ludwig. 23
Zahn, Theodor, 21
Zosimus. 38, 56-57, 65, 89, 128,
130, 141

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be supplied bound in cloth, for 50c. additional. All prices are net.

The set of fifty-nine volumes, covering monographs 1-145, is offered, bound, for $196: except that
Volume II can be supplied only in part, and in paper covers, no. 1 of that volume being out of print.
Volumes m, IV and XXV, can now be supplied only in connection with complete sets.

For further information, apply to

Prof. EDWIN R. A. SELIGIVIAN, Columbia University,

or to JVIessrs. LONGIVIANS, GREEN & CO.. New York.
London: P. S. KING & SON, Orchard House, Westminster.

*1v

Date Due

ADD 1 g .^ir\-

"^ki Ai liiil iiiff

': Her

1 4 'II

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Full text of "Constantine the Great and Christianity"

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