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Claudian, Christ and the Cult of the Saints*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

J. Vanderspoel
J. Vanderspoel
Affiliation:
University of Toronto
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Extract

Current scholarly opinion holds that the poet Claudian was a pagan who was able to hide sufficiently his personal views at a largely Christian court. This opinion is not unanimous: Claudian has in the past occasionally been considered a Christian, and recently that view has reappeared in print. That Claudian wrote carm. min. 32, de saluatore, should not be doubted; yet this collection of stock phrases cannot be considered Claudian's credo. As Gnilka has shown, Claudian's treatment of the traditional gods and goddesses displays warmth and fondness beyond the requirements of epic and consequently reveals his true beliefs. The poem is an Easter card for Honorius, displaying not religious convictions, but an instinct for survival at a Christian court. The exegesis of Carmina Minora 50 here proposed suggests that Claudian was familiar enough with Christian ideas to criticise them. Nothing hinders him from repeating them when it proved advantageous.

The interpretation of carm. min. 50 depends in some measure on the literary relationship between Claudian and the Christian poet Prudentius. Specifically, it is important to ascertain whether Claudian was aware of the work of his contemporary. Several studies have argued that Prudentius read and used Claudian, but only recently has Cameron suggested Claudian also read and used Prudentius. His arguments and example are convincing and conclusive, revealing at the same time the nature of Claudian's use of his contemporary's words and ideas. Because similar echoes of Prudentius' poetry will appear in the interpretation of carm. min. 50, it will be useful to cite the example here.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 36 , Issue 1 , May 1986 , pp. 244 - 255
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1986

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References

1 See especially Cameron, A., Claudian. Poetry and Propaganda at the Court of Honorius (1970)Google Scholar, Ch. VIII ‘The Pagan at a Christian court’ [hereafter Cameron].

2 For a survey of the problem and the views, Schmid, W., Reallexicon für Antike and Christentum, 3 (1957), 158–65Google Scholar.

3 Sebesta, J. L., ‘Claudian's Credo: the de salvatore’, CB 56 (1980), 33–7Google Scholar.

4 ‘Götter and Dämonen in den Gedichten Claudians’, A & A 18 (1973), 144ffGoogle Scholar.

5 So Cameron, 215–16. Raby, F. J. E., Secular Latin Poetry 2 (1957), i.96Google Scholar, calls the poem ‘coldly orthodox’.

6 For discussion, see Cameron, 469–73; also the important study of Weyman, C., ‘Zur Chronologie der Dichtungen des Prudentius’, Berl. Phil. Woch. 17 (1897), 977–86Google Scholar = Beiträge zur Geschichte der christlich-lateinischen Poesie (1926), 64–71.

7 Cameron, 470–3.

8 Cameron, 472, his italics.

9 See e.g. Paschoud, F., Roma Aeterna (1967), 138Google Scholar. In his Loeb edition of Claudian, ii. 279, M. Platnauer also seems to understand these lines in this way.

10 Cf. OLD s.v. sic 8 d; also Nisbet, and Hubbard, on Horace, Carm. 1.3.1Google Scholar.

11 Seeck, O., Regesten der Kaiser und Päpste (1919), 304Google Scholar; Barnes, T. D., ‘The historical setting of of Prudentius' Contra Symmachum’, AJP 97 (1976), 374Google Scholar, where Good Friday should be Easter.

12 On the joint importance of Peter and Paul at Rome in the late fourth and early fifth centuries, see now Huskinson, J. M., Concordia Apostolorum: Christian Propaganda at Rome in the Fourth and Fifth Centuries. A Study in Early Christian Iconography and Iconology. BAR International Series 148 (1982), esp. 77–107Google Scholar.

13 On the renovations of the two churches, see Ruysschaert, J., ‘Prudence l'espagnol poète des deux basiliques romaines de S. Pierre et de S. Paul’, RAC 42 (1966), 267–86Google Scholar.

14 Levy, H. L., Claudian's in Rufinum: An Exegetical Commentary (1971), 233–4Google Scholar, and Matthews, J., Western Aristocracies and Imperial Court A.D. 364–425 (1975), 134–6Google Scholar, both citing Pargoire, J., ‘Rufinianes’, BZ 8 (1899), 429–77Google Scholar.

15 The letters of Vigilius, , which I quote as edited in PL 13Google Scholar, also appear at Acta Sanctorum, Maii Tomus Septimus (1866), 41–4, with an introduction and other accounts at 37–41. The manuscript heading reads: ‘Incipit Epistola S. Vigilii, de laudibus beatissimorum martyrum Sisinnii, Alexandri, et Martyrii, quorum reliquiae per Jacobum uirum illustrem ad Ioannem Episcopum urbis Constantinopolitanae peruenerunt.’

16 Brummer, G., ‘Wer war Jacobus? Zur Deutung von Claudian C.M. 50’, BZ 65 (1972), 339–52Google Scholar; PLRE ii. 581–2.

17 ‘going to deposit upon the companions of Christ his authority as an officer…I say “going to deposit” because authority built up with God cannot be laid down’, a periphrasis for Jacobus' ultimate destination in heaven.

18 Barnes, T. D., ‘Late Roman prosopography: between Theodosius and Justinian’, Phoenix 37 (1983), 267CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

19 See Holum, K. G., Theodosian Empresses. Women and Imperial Dominion in Late Antiquity (1982), 57, 69Google Scholar. Socrates, , HE 6.2.11Google Scholar, provides the date.

20 A portion of the relics remained at Milan, while other parts went to Ravenna and Brescia; see Delehaye, H., Les Origines du culte des martyres 2 (1933), 326, 334–5Google Scholar.

21 (Above, n. 19), 56f.

22 T. D. Barnes (above, n. 18), 267.

23 James, M. R., The Apocryphal New Testament (1924), 434–8Google Scholar.

24 Hall, J., Dictionary of Signs and Symbols in Art 2 (1979), 301Google Scholar, reports that Thomas is sometimes depicted with spears in his body.

25 Delehaye (above, n. 20), 326.

26 On 22 August 394, according to the Chronicle of Edessa; cf. Hallier, L., Untersuchungen über die Edessenische Chronik. Texte and Untersuchungen 9 (1893), 103Google Scholar. Cf. also Delehaye (above, n. 20), 212–13.

27 Edited at PG 59.497–500. Cf. Fargues, P., Claudien. Étude sur sa poésie et son temps (1933), 161–2Google Scholar.

28 James (above, n. 23), 468.

29 Delehaye, H., Les Passions des martyrs et les genres littéraires 2 (1966), 197ff.Google Scholar, points out that the cruelty experienced by martyrs is a topos. The beating and flaying seem to represent different traditions.

30 Delehaye (above, n. 20), 325.

31 Hall (above, n. 24), 41.

32 Contemporary references to the martyrs, including Augustine, , Ep. 139Google Scholar (CSEL 44.152), two sermons of Maximus of Turin (PL 57.695–8) and a sermon of Gaudentius of Brescia (PL 20.959–71 at 963), as well as the writings of Vigilius, do not make the comparison. Cameron, 218, cites the church at Ravenna as a possibility for understanding the poem.

33 See Acta Sanctorum, Augusti Tomus Secundus (1867), 624–32, and Delaney, J. J. and Tobin, J. E., Dictionary of Catholic Biography (1961), 1091Google Scholar. The de lapsu Susannae, on which see n. 43 below, calls the Old Testament Susanna (12) ‘fortissima illa Susanna’.

34 Amore, A., in Bibliotheca Sanctorum, 12 (1969), 78–80Google Scholar, discusses the evidence for the cult of Susanna and suggests a number of possible identifications.

35 Pietri, C., Roma Christiana (1976), 498–501Google Scholar, doubts the existence of an early cult of Susanna, but (501) allows the possibility of a cult in a private foundation.

36 Prudentius refers to this event with some similarity of phrasing at Cath. 5.54–5: currus pars et equos et uolucres rotasi|conscendunt celeres,…

37 For a recent discussion, see Paschoud, F., Zosime. Histoire Nouvelle, Tome II, 2 (1979), 474–500Google Scholar.

38 See Lampe, G. W. H., A Patristic Greek Lexicon (1961–1968)Google Scholar and Bauer, W., Arndt, W. F. and Gingrich, F. W., A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature 2 (1979)Google Scholar, s.v. ῥομɸαία. For Latin, see e.g. Tertullian, , An. 55.4Google Scholar, where romphaea is the paradisi ianitrix, and J. H. Waszink's comments ad loc., and Jerome, Ep. 60.3: flammea illa romphaea, custos paradisi.

39 Claudian may have derived his idea of an ultrix romphaea from Prud. Peri. 5.189–192: romphaea nam caelestium | uindex erit uoluminum | tanti ueneni interpretem | linguam perurens fulmine.

40 On the peculiarly Roman tradition, see Dagron, G., Vie et Miracles de Sainte Thècle (1978), 49–50Google Scholar. In the version which became the basis for the Roman version, Thecla is joined in her ascetic life by numerous other women, id. 48.

41 Kennedy, V. L., The Saints of the Canon of the Mass 2 (1963), 71Google Scholar.

42 Fasola, U. M., ‘La basilica sotterranea di S. Tecla e le regioni cimiteriali vicine’, RAC 46 (1970), 209–11, 229–31, 258Google Scholar.

43 In the manuscripts, this work is ascribed to Niceta, Ambrose and Jerome. For the claim of Niceta, see Burn, A. E., Niceta of Remesiana. His Life and Works (1905), cxxxi–cxxxviGoogle Scholar, and Gamber, K., Niceta von Remesiana. De lapsu Susannae. Textus Patristici et Liturgici 7 (1969), 18–22Google Scholar. Cazzaniga, E., Incerti auctoris de lapsu Susannae (1948), lvi–lxiiGoogle Scholar, is more cautious. I cite the text from the edition of Gamber.

44 Cf. Fargues (above, n. 27), 162.

45 The earlier view that little, if any, of Prudentius' poetry was published before 405 has been superseded by several studies: Thraede, K., Studien zur Sprache und Stil des Prudentius. Hypomnemata 13 (1965), 76–8 with nn. 184–6Google Scholar; Cameron, 470–1; Barnes (above, n. 11), 377, and Herrera, I. Rodrίguez, Poeta Christianus. Esencia y mision del poeta cristiano en la obra de Prudencio (1981, translation of Poeta Christianus. Prudentius' Auffassung vom Wesen und von der Aufgabe des christlichen Dichters [Diss. Munich, 1936; unavailable to me]), 16–19Google Scholar, who argues that the Psychomachia, the most important poem for the present paper, is referred to in the preface to the omnibus edition and belongs to 398–400, contra Bergmann, J., Aurelii Prudentii Clementii Carmina (1926Google Scholar = CSEL 61), 11–13, who dates Ps. to after 405. Smith, M., Prudentius' Psychomachia. A Reexamination (1976), 3Google Scholar, accepts the view of Bergmann without argument.

46 Barnes (above, n. 11), 373–6 with notes.

47 Cameron, 180ff., Barnes (above, n. 11), 383–4.

48 O'Donnell, J. J., Cassiodorus (1979), 36–43Google Scholar.

49 Thompson, E. A., The Visigoths in the Time of Ulfila (1966), 86ff., 107ffGoogle Scholar.

50 See now Barnes (above, n. 18), 269, correcting PLRE ii. 981.

51 Barnes (above, n. 11), 376. Cameron, 180 and 184–5 suggests May/June 402.

52 Barnes (above, n. 11), 378–83. Harries, J., ‘Prudentius and Theodosius’, Latomus 43 (1984), 74ff.Google Scholar, now argues that Prudentius, wrote Cont. Symm. I in 394 or 395Google Scholar and that the purpose of Symmachus' journey to the court in the winter of 401/2 was not to plead the pagan cause once again. For my purposes here, it is immaterial whether the real or only the dramatic date of Cont. Symm. I falls in 394/5.

53 Weyman (above, n. 6); Cameron, 248, 473. Harries (previous note), 76 agrees that Claudian, 's effort precedes Cont. Symm. IIGoogle Scholar.

54 Barnes (above, n. 11), 386.

55 Cameron, 218 on other grounds also dates the poem to 402/403. For my reconstruction of the publishing sequence, 403 (but before the battle of Verona) is more suitable.

56 (Above, n. 11), 376–8. Harries (above, n. 52), 78–9 also regards the prefaces as later than the rest of the poem.

57 As Harries (above, n. 52), 79 suggests.