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A Note on the Great Persecution in the West

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 March 2016

W. H. C. Frend
W. H. C. Frend*
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
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Extract

The Great Persecution in the Western provinces of the Roman Empire was relatively short and sharp. Eusebius in both his Ecclesiastical History and the Martyrs of Palestine contrasts the eight long years of repression suffered by the East, first under Diocletian and Galerius and then under Maximian, with the persecution of ‘scarcely two years’ duration’ endured by the Western Christians. In the West, indeed, the persecution of Valerian 257-60 seems to have been longer and perhaps more costly in human lives, and that of Decius more dangerous to the Church.

Type
Research Article
Information
Studies in Church History , Volume 2: Papers read at the second winter and summer meetings of the Ecclesiastical History Society , 1965 , pp. 141 - 148
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1965

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References

page 141 note 1 Hist. Eccles. (ed. Oulton, J. E. L.), VIII, 6, 10Google Scholar (severity of persecution in Africa) and VIII, 13, 12 (short duration). Mart. Palest, (ed. Lawlor, H. J. and Oulton, J. E. L.), XIII, 12.Google Scholar

page 141 note 2 de Ste Croix, G. E. M., ‘Aspects of the “Great” Persecution,’ Harvard Theological Review, XLVII, pt 2 (1954), 74–113 Google Scholar, especially 84-6, taking up a suggestion made by C. Bigg, The Origins of Christianity, 482-3.

page 141 note 3 Ste Croix, art. cit. 84-5.

page 142 note 1 Routh, M. J., Reliquiae Sacrae, III, 321-49Google Scholar, and see Schwartz, E., ‘Zur Geschichte des Athanasius,’ Göttingen Nachrichten, phil. hist.Kl., 1905, 166–75.Google Scholar

page 142 note 2 Hefele-H., C. J. Leclerca, Hist, des Conciles, I, pt i, 301–26 Google Scholar, and Mansi, , Concilia, II, 513-22.Google Scholar

page 142 note 3 Ed. Ziwsa, C., CSEL, xxvi, 185-97,Google Scholar and see the author’s The Donatist Church, Oxford 1952, 11-12.

page 142 note 4 Pseudo-Cyprian, Ep., 3 (CSEL, 111, pt 3, 273-4). This is an extremely interesting document, to which attention was first drawn by Mercati, G. in 1899 (‘Un falso donatistico nelle opere di S. Cypriano,’ in Rendic. degli Institut. Lombardo di Sci. e Letter. Ser. ii, 32 (1899), 986-97Google Scholar, and revised by the author in Studi e Testi, 77 (1937), 268-78). It is just possible that this encyclical could be the work of Mensurius. The Council was held immediately after the restoration of churches, and the tendency is moderate. Traditores would be investigated by category and lay communion would not be denied to penitents. The reference, too, to antecessores nostri (p. 274) could indicate Mensurius. At the same time, the appeal to sententiam fixam sanctis et amicis Dei, strongly suggests the sentence of the Abitinian confessors towards whom Mensurius had no friendly feel ings. He would also have found himself criticised among those who had even pretended to hand over copies of the Scriptures (qui utique finget tradere supplebit traditionem). On the whole, one is inclined to suggest an encyclical by Donatus, perhaps as early as summer 313.

page 142 note 5 Canon 13.

page 142 note 6 Peter of Alexandria, Canons 5 and 6.

page 142 note 7 Gesta Purgationis Felicis (ed. Ziwsa, 197-204) at 198-9, ‘ex jussione proconsulari omnes sacrificarent et si quas scripturas haberent, offerrent secundum sacram legem.’ See also, Augustine, , Contra Cresconium, III, 27, 30Google Scholar (account of Secundus of Tigisis’ synod at Cirta in 305). On the other hand, the Acta Saturnini (PL, 8, 690 and 705) indicate that the edicts of Diocletian and Maximian for 303 ordered only the handing over of the Scriptures and forbade Christian assemblages.

page 143 note 1 For a study of Eusebius’s ‘persecution years’ see Lawlor, H. J., Eusebiana, Oxford 1912, 179–81.Google Scholar

page 143 note 2 See Optatus of Milevis, De Schismate Donatistarum (ed. Ziwsa, C., CSEL, xxvi), 1, 18, ‘Maxentio christianis libertas est restiruta.’Google Scholar

page 143 note 3 H.E. VIII, vi, 10: каі μαλιστα των (μαρτύριων) κατά ттју ‘Африеђу καί та Μαΰρων ίθνοί θηβαβα re каі κατ’ Άίγιτπτον.

page 143 note 4 Ibid. VIII, 9

page 143 note 5 Lactantius, , De Mortibus Persecutorum (ed. Moreau, J., Sources chrétiennes 39), 11 and 12Google Scholar.

page 144 note 1 Eusebius, Mart. Palest. Praefatio, ‘Presidents of the churches should all everywhere be first committed to prison, and then afterwards compelled by every kind of device to do sacrifice.’

page 144 note 2 Lactantius, De Mortibus, 13, 2. His name, Syrian Martyrology (ed. H. Lietzmann, Kleine Texte 2, g).

page 144 note 3 Mart. Pal. 2, 2.

page 144 note 4 Mart. Agape, Eirene, Chime 5 (ed. Knopf, and Krüger, , Ausgewählte Märtyrerakten, 1929, 97–8)Google Scholar

page 144 note 5 Acta Saturnini 2; cf.Augustine, , Breviculus Collationis cum Donatistis III, 13, 25Google Scholar; PL, 43, 637. See also Franchi di Cavalieri, P., Studi e Testi, 65 (1935), 3–5.Google Scholar

page 144 note 6 Dating: iii Kal. Aug., Carthage Calendar of Martyrs, ed. H. Lietzmann, op. cit. 5. Discussed by Monceaux, P., Histoire littéraire de l’Afrique chrétienne, III, 148–51 Google Scholar. Text: Analecta Bollandiana, ix (1890), 110-16.

page 144 note 7 Acta Crispinae (ed. Knopf and Krüger, op. cit. 109-11). Monceaux, P., Hist. litt. III, 159-61Google Scholar. For the ‘Twenty Martyrs’ who also refused to sacrifice, P. Monceaux, op. cit. 153.

page 145 note 1 See P. Monceaux’ list, op. cit. 169-71, supplemented by discoveries up to 1940 in Berthier, A. and colleagues, Les Vestiges du Christianisme antique dans la Numidie centrale, Algiers 1942, 210 Google Scholar

page 145 note 2 ‘Qui persecutionem Diocletiani et Maximiani divinis legibus passi sunt.’ Published in the Bull, archéologique du Comité des Travaux historiques, 1934, 68-9, and Delehaye, H., Analecta Bollandiana, LIV (1936), 313–16 Google Scholar.

page 145 note 3 CIL, vin, 6700-19353, ‘qui sunt passi sunt sub preside Floro in civitate Milevitana in diebus thurificationis.’ See also Gsell, S., Bull. Arch, du Comité, 1899, 452–4.Google Scholar

page 145 note 4 Optatus, op. cit. iii, 8. Under Floras, ‘christiani idoloram cogebantur ad templa’ (i.e. not traditio).

page 145 note 5 CIL, VIII, 2345-7.

page 145 note 6 CIL, VIII, 4764-18698 (Macomades). Quintianus is never mentioned as a persecutor.

page 145 note 7 Leschi, L., ‘Le Centenarium d’Aqua Viva,’ Revue Africaine, LXXXVII (1943), 5–22 Google Scholar. The inscription also mentions Valerius Alexander ‘agens vices praefectorum praetorio,’ who may be the ‘Comes Valerius’ who judged the confessor Mammarius in May-June 304.

page 146 note 1 See Goodchild, R. G. and Perkins, J. B. Ward, ‘ The Limes Tripolitanus in the light of Recent Discoveries,’ Journ. Roman Studies, xxxix (1949), 81–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar A centenarium built in the reign of Philip, 91. For Quintianus’s career, de Lessert, Pallu, Fastes des provinces africaines, 11, 1 312–14.Google Scholar

page 146 note 2 CIL, VIII, 5526-18860, 7965.

page 146 note 3 Acta Sancii Philippi (ed. Ruinait), 440-8.

page 146 note 4 As in the case of Felix of Aptunga.

page 146 note 5 Pseudo-Cyprian, Ep. iii, and note the description of the Donatist martyr Marculus (executed 347) in the Passio Marculi as ‘statim mundanas litteras respuens’ on conversion (PL, 8, 760D).

page 146 note 6 Acta Saturnini, 18 (PL, 8, 701B).

page 147 note 1 Ibid. 18 (PL, 8, 701B-C).

page 147 note 2 See Grant, R. M., The Earliest Lives of Jesus, 1961, ch. ii.Google Scholar

page 147 note 3 Origen, , Comment, in Joann. 10, 4 (ed. Preuschen, E., Leipzig 1903)Google Scholar.

page 147 note 4 Examples given in Grant, op. cit. 62-4.

page 147 note 5 Athanasius, , Orat. contra Arianes 1, 9 (26, 28).Google Scholar

page 148 note 1 Note for instance, the tradition preserved in the Passio Tipasii, 8, ‘Maximianus qui persecutionis fuerat princeps’ (Text, Analecta Bollandiana, ix (1890), 123).

page 148 note 2 Gwatkin, H. M., Early Church History A.D. 313, 11, 339.Google Scholar

page 148 note 3 Grégoire, H., ‘Les Persécutions dans l’Empire romain,’ Mém. de l’Académie royale de Belgique, XLVI, pt i (1951), 128-30.Google Scholar

page 148 note 4 Canons 1-4.