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Two Christians in the Familia Caesaris

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 June 2011

G. W. Clarke
G. W. Clarke
Affiliation:
University of MelbourneParkville, victoria, Australia, 3052
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Extract

There are, notoriously, a number of general literary observations on the large number of Christians in Caesar's household and in Caesar's employ in the late second and in the third centuries A.D. but there are remarkably few particular examples to substantiate these general claims. Particularly rare (for reasons of security?) are traces of such individual Christians outside the literary remains. C.I.L. 6.8987 (= Diehl I.L.C.V. 3872) would appear to be an exception and to record two such Christians of Caesar's household. It thus provides welcome attestation, though, curiously, the inscription has seldom been exploited for this information.

Type
Notes and Observations
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 64 , Issue 1 , January 1971 , pp. 121 - 124
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1971

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References

1 E.g., Irenaeus, Adv. Haer. 4.30.1 (on which see H.T.R. 59 [1966], 95ff), TERT., Apol. 37.4 (”implevimus …. palatium”), Dionysus of Alexandria ap. Euseb. H.E. 7.10.3 (”[Valerian's] whole house had been filled with pious persons, and was a church of God.”).

2 The main candidates are collected by Harnack, A., The Expansion of Christianity in the First Three Centuries, trans. Moffat, J., II (1905), 199ffGoogle Scholar.

3 Some, for example, have endeavoured to bring in the Innocentii, I.L.C.V. 3995 A, B, C; see, against, my note The Collegium Funeraticium of the Innocentii, Antichthon I (1967), 45ff., and compare Marrou, H.-I., Encore les ”Innocentii” de San Sebastiano, Mélanges d'archéologie, d'épigraphe et d'histore offerts à J. Carcopino (Paris, 1966), 657ffGoogle Scholar.

4 A rare exception is Bardy, G., La latinisation de l'Église d'Occident, Irénikon 14 (1937), 113ffGoogle Scholar. at 115 (who, however, unwisely takes residence in the quarter vicus Caput Africae as evidence for African provenance). Cf. H. U. Instsky, Marcus Aurelius Prosenes-Freigelassener und Christ am Kaiserhof, Akad. der Wiss. and der Lit. in Mainz Abh. der Geistes- und Sozialwiss. Kl. (1964.3), 113ff. at 120f.

5 ”Alexander, slave of the Augusti, erected in his own lifetime [this tomb] to Marcus his very dear son, pupil of Ad Caput Africae, who was a keeper of the wardrobe and who lived 8 years, 9 months, and 5 days. I beg of you, kind brethren, by the one god, to prevent anyone molesting this tombstone after my death.”

6 E.g., Min. Fel., Oct. 10.3ff.: ”Unde aute vel quis ille aut ubi deus unicus, solitarius, destitutus.”

7 E.g., Min. Fel., Oct. 9.2. ”se promisee appellant fratres et sorores.”

8 MOHLER, S. L., Slave Education in the Roman Empire, T.A.P.A. 71 (1940), 262ff. at 273fGoogle Scholar.

9 Mohler, op. cit., 274f. unpersuasively suggests on the evidence of a single graffito (”Epitynchanus et Asiaticus frat.”) from the so-called paedagogum on the Palatine that pupils at paedagogia did in fact address each other as ”frater.” In the graffito, he concludes, the two persons could not be actual brothers because some one named Asiaticus could not be the brother of someone named Epitynchanus. That false deduction is adequately refuted by Chantraine, H., Freigelassene und Sklaven in Dienst der römschen Kaiser (Wiesbaden, 1967), 131f.Google Scholar; cf. THY-LANDER, H., Étude sur l'Épigraphie Latine (Lund, 1952), 153ffGoogle Scholar.

10 Note C.I.L. 6.1052 recording in 198 A.D. a dedication made by twenty-four (the full complement?) freedmen teachers of the establishment.

11 E.g., a gymnasium (C.I.L. 5.1039 = I.L.S. 1826, an ”unctor ad Caput Africaes [sic!]”), medical service (C.I.L. 6.8981, a ”magister iatrolipta”), etc. See, in general, FORBES, C. A., The Education and Training of Slaves in Antiquity, T.A.P.A. 86 (1955), 321ff. at 334ffGoogle Scholar.

12 See articles by WEAVER, P. R. C., The slave and freedman 'cursus' in the imperial administration, Proc. Camb. Phil. Soc., n.s. 10 (1964), 74ff. at 77ff.Google Scholar, Social Mobility in the Early Roman Empire, Past and Present, 37 (1967), 3ff. at 6ff., Family dating criteria, Proximi and 'Provincia' in theCrossRefGoogle ScholarCaesaris, Familia, J.R.S. 58 (1968), 110ff. at 121ffGoogle Scholar.

13 WEAVER, P. R. C., Past and Present 37 (1967), at 8ffCrossRefGoogle Scholar.

14 WEAVER, P. R. C., Vicarius and Vicarianus in the Familia Caesaris, J.R.S. 54 (1964), 117ffGoogle Scholar.

15 CYP., Ep. 80.1 (C.S.E.L. 3.2.840): ”Caesariani autem quicumque vcl prius confessi fuerant vel nunc confessi fuerint confiscentur et vincti in Caesarianas pos-sessiones descripti mittantur.”

16 I.L.C.V. 3872 ad loc. Cf. G. Bardy, art. cit., 115; he dates the inscription to ”lépoque de Sévère et de Caracalla.”

17 See KAJANTO, I., Onomastic Studies in the Early Christian Inscriptions of Rome and Carthage (Helsinki, 1963), 61Google Scholar.

18 Professor P. R. C. Weaver (by letter).

19 See WEAVER, P. R. C., The status nomenclature of the imperial slaves, C.Q. 14 (1964), 134ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar, idem, libertus, Augustorum, Historia 13 (1964). 188ff.Google Scholar, H. Chantraine, op. cit., 225ff.

20 WEAVER, P. R. C., C.Q. 14 (1964), 139Google Scholar, H. Chantrae, op. cit., 231f, 236ff.

21 The latest dated inscription of the paedagogium is 214 A.D. (C.I.L. 6.8986).