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Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity

Arbeiten zur Kirchengeschichte
Begründet von
Karl Holl† und Hans Lietzmann†
herausgegeben von
Christian Albrecht und Christoph Markschies
Band 119
De Gruyter

Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity
Edited by
Johan Leemans, Peter Van Nuffelen,
Shawn W. J. Keough and Carla Nicolaye
De Gruyter

ISBN 978-3-11-026855-3
e-ISBN 978-3-11-026860-7
ISSN 1861-5996
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Episcopal elections in late antiquity / [edited by] Johan Leemans ... [et al.].
p. cm. - (Arbeiten zur Kirchengeschichte, ISSN 1861-5996 ; Bd. 119)
English, French, and German.
Includes bibliographical references and indexes.
ISBN 978-3-11-026855-3 (hardcover 23 ¥ 15,5 : alk. paper)
1. Bishops - Appointment, call, and election - History. 2. Church
history - Primitive and early church, ca. 30-600. I. Leemans, Johan,
1965-
BV664.E65 2011
2621.1220901 dc23
2011022770
Bibliografische Information der Deutsche Nationalbibliothek
Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek verzeichnet diese Publikation in der Deutschen
Nationalbibliografie; detaillierte bibliografische Daten sind im Internet
über http://dnb.d-nb.de abrufbar.
© 2011 Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, Berlin/Boston
Druck: Hubert & Co. GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen
00 Gedruckt auf säurefreiem Papier
Printed in Germany
www.degruyter.com

In memoriam Boudewijn Dehandschutter
(1945-2011)

Preface
The present volume is the result of the conference 'Episcopal Elections in
Late Antiquity (ca. 250-600 A.D.)', held in Leuven between 26 and 28
October 2009. Its aim was to re-assess the phenomenon of episcopal elec
tions from the broadest possible perspective, examining the various factors,
personalities, rules and habits that played a role in the process that resulted
in one specific candidate becoming the new bishop. In particular it was
the purpose of the conference to approach this phenomenon through a
large number of case studies. The conference was a joyful event, profiting
from a late autumn sun and the excellent facilities of the university's con
ference center in the middle of the beautiful surroundings of the Grand
Beguinage of Leuven. After a rigorous process of peer-review and due revi
sion, a number of papers was selected which form, together with the main
papers, a representative collection of case studies. We consciously do not
wish to cover the later Roman empire in its full chronological and geo
graphical extension. This is not only practically impossible, but it would
also generate a false impression of homogeneity. The volume rather wishes
to display the variety of practices that existed in different places and at
different times, and to present new dimensions of the phenomenon by
drawing on distinct methodologies. In this way, we hope to provide build
ing blocks for a future synthesis of episcopal elections and to contribute to
the continuous new assessment of the crucial figure of the late antique
bishop by focussing more on ordinary bishops and the social and political
dimension of their position.
The conference was part of a project sponsored by the Flemish Fund
for Scientific Research, entitled: "Nobody Should Become Bishop before
He is Thirty Years Old". A Historical and Theological Study of Episcopal
Succession in Late Antiquity (250-600 AD) (Project G.0575.07N). The
FSR-F project-funding provided the two collaborators, Dr. S.W.J.
Keough and Dra. C. Nicolaye (part time), with the freedom to devote
themselves to scholarly work on episcopal succession. Moreover, the FSR-
F supported the conference with a substantial conference grant, allowing
for the invitation of additional keynote speakers. We express our warmest
thanks for this generous support. We also thank wholeheartedly the Re-

VIII Preface
search Council of the K.U. Leuven for their financial support of the confe
rence.
During the editing of this book we received support for which it is a
pleasant duty to express thanks. First of all we thank the Faculty of Theol
ogy (K.U. Leuven), the Faculty of Arts (Ghent University), the Lichten-
berg Kolleg (DFG-supported Institute of Advanced Study at the Universi
ty of Gottingen) and the Department of Ancient History of the RWTH-
Aachen for the institutional framework and support provided. We express
our thanks to Walter de Gruyter Verlag in the person of Dr. A. Dohnert,
the responsible editor, for the smooth cooperation towards the publication
of this book. Thanks are also due to Hajnalka Tamas (Leuven) and Andy
Hilkens (Ghent) who helped with the final editing and with the indices.
When this volume neared completion, Professor Boudewijn Dehand-
schutter, the main promoter of the project passed away. He had already
been ill, recovered during the autumn of 2010 but ultimately the disease
got firmly hold on him again. He passed away in peace of mind. He was a
great scholar, an unsurpassable Doktorvater and a good friend. We re
member him with admiration, gratefulness and affection. This volume is
dedicated to his memory.
Peter Van Nuffelen
JohanLeemans

Table of Contents
Preface VII
Peter Van Nuffelen -Johan Leemans
Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity:
Structures and Perspectives 1
Keynote Lectures
Pauline Allen
Episcopal Succession in Antioch in the Sixth Century 23
Timothy David Barnes
The Election of Ambrose of Milan 39
George A. Bevan
Theodoret of Cyrrhus and Syrian Episcopal Elections 61
Philippe Blaudeau
Selection d'archeveques diphysites au trone alexandrin
(451-482): une designation artificielle et contrainte? 89
Peter Brum
BischofswahlundBischofsernennungimSynodiconOrientale 109
Bruno Dumezil
La royaute merovingienne et les elections episcopales au Vie siecle .. 127
Geoffrey D.Dunn
Canonical Legislation on the Ordination of Bishops:
Innocent I's Letter to Victricius of Rouen 145
RudolfHaensch
Christlicher Euergetismus ob honorem? Die Einsetzung von
Klerikern in ihre Amter und die von diesen vorangetriebenen
Bauprojekte 167

X Table of Contents
David G. Hunter
Clerical Marriage and Episcopal Elections in the Latin West:
FromSiriciustoLeoI 183
VeitRosenberger
The Saint and the Bishop: Severinus ofNoricum 203
Raymond Van Dam
Bishops and Clerics during the Fourth Century:
Numbers and Their Implications 217
Peter Van Nuffelen
The Rhetoric of Rules and the Rule of Consensus 243
Ewa Wipszycka
Les elections episcopales en Egypte aux VF-VIP siecles 259
EckhardWirbelauer
BischofswahleninRom(3.-6.Jh.):
Bedingungen-Akteure-Verfahren 293
Short Papers
FredericAlpi
Les elections episcopales en Orient
sous Severe d'Antioche (512-518) 307
Daniel Alt
.. .ut sancto sanctus succederet... oder: Haben Heilige eine Wahl?
Ein Ausblick auf die fruhmittelalterliche Bischofserhebung
indenVitenheiligerBischofe 315
RenateDekker
Bishop Pesynthios of Koptos (Egypt): "He did not pursue the honour,
but it was the honour that pursued him" 331
FedericoFatti
An Extraordinary Bishop: Eusebius of Caesarea in Cappadocia 343

Table of Contents XI
Oliver Hihn
The Election and Deposition of Meletius of Antioch:
The Fall ofan Integrative Bishop 357
Christian Hornung
Haeres Petri: Kontinuitat und Wandel in der Bischofsnachfolge
desSiriciusvonRom 375
ShawnW.J.Keough
Episcopal Succession as Criterion of Communion: The Rise of
Rival Episcopal Genealogies in Alexandria according to
Liberatus of Carthage 389
Young Richard Kim
Epiphanius of Cyprus vs. John of Jerusalem: An Improper Ordination
and the Escalation of the Origenist Controversy 411
Susan Loftus
Episcopal Elections in Gaul: The Normative View of the
Concilia Galliae versus the Narrative Accounts 423
AramMardirossian
Ecclesia non abhorret a sanguine. Les elections episcopales
dans l'Eglise armenienne aux IVe-Ve siecles 437
Jaclyn Maxwell
Education, Humility and Choosing Ideal Bishops in Late Antiquity 449
David McOmish
The Manipulation of Tradition: The Past as a Tool for Political
and Religious Victory during the Laurentian Controversy 463
CarlaNicolaye
Episcopal Elections in 5th-century Vandal North Africa 477
Claudia Rammelt
Bischofswechsel in Edessa zur Zeit der christologischen
Auseinandersetzung 499
JosefRist
Zum Beispiel Proklos von Konstantinopel. Uber Chancen und
Grenzen des spatantiken Bischofsamtes 515

XII Table of Contents
OlehShchuryk
The Election of Sahak I as Catholicos of the Armenian Church 531
Andreas Thier
Procedure and Hierarchy: Models of Episcopal Election in
Late Antique Conciliar and Papal Rule Making 541
Johannes A. van Waarden
Episcopal Self-Presentation: Sidonius Apollinaris and the Episcopal
Election in Bourges AD 470 555
DanalulianaViezure
The Election of Paul the Jew (519) in Light of the Theopaschite
Controversy 563
ListofAuthors 575
Indices 577
Indexnominum 577
Indexrerum 586
Indexlocorum 587

Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity: Structures and
Perspectives
Peter Van Nuffelen - Johan Leemans
In the second book of his Ecclesiastical History (2.6.3) Socrates writes
about the events surrounding the succession of bishop Alexander of Con
stantinople in 337. According to the church historian, Alexander gave his
community the following message on his deathbed: "If you want an hon
est and wise teacher, choose the young presbyter Paulus. If you want
somebody who distinguishes himself by giving an impression of piety,
then choose the old deacon Macedonia". Despite the clarity of the de
ceased bishop's advice, both candidates did not get a clear majority behind
them. Factors playing a role here are not only their different personality
and way of life Socrates is referring to but also their different theological
position within the Trinitarian debates of their time: Paul seems to have
been attached more to a Nicene-inspired theology while Macedonius
seems to have adopted a more arianising, subordinationist position. Politi
cal pressure nor riots in the Constantinopolitan streets helped to resolve
the tensions and ultimately each group ordained its own candidate. The
deadlock did not last long: emperor Constantius II supported Macedonius
and sent Paul into exile.
This incident illustrates the complexity of late antique episcopal suc
cession, in which many elements played a role, such as: local traditions
(the apparent usage that the bishop had a say in the election of his succes
sor); church politics and doctrinal conflicts (here "Arianism" versus a "Ni-
cene" theology); imperial politics (the intervention by Constantius II);
canon and civil law (was the "double ordination" of Macedonius and Paul
lawful and was it lawful that the emperor intervened in church affairs?);
the role of the people that voiced its opinion through acclamations and
street riots; theological ideas about the "ideal bishop"; the personality and
charisma of each of the candidates.
The present volume contributes to a reassessment of the phenomenon
of episcopal elections from the broadest possible perspective, examining
the varied combination of factors, personalities, rules and habits that
played a role in the process that eventually resulted in one candidate tri-

2 Peter Van Nuffelen - johan Leemans
umphing. The importance of episcopal elections hardly needs stating: with
the bishop emerging as one of the key figures of late antique society, his
election was a defining moment for the local community and an occasion
when local, ecclesiastical, and secular tensions were played out. Drawing
and expanding on older contributions,1 a few general studies have recently
been dedicated to the phenomenon.2 The reason for adding a volume of
papers to these publications is that the existing syntheses, for all their me
rits, tend to impose a uniformity on electoral practices throughout the
later Roman empire, often by implicitly taking the practices of the majori
ty church in the main cities as normative. There are obvious reasons for
doing so: the sees of, say, Rome, Alexandria, and Constantinople are
among the best documented and most powerful of the age. Nevertheless,
the late antique church was much more diverse and that diversity needs
first to be understood before an accurate synthesis can take shape. The
present introduction sets out some considerations regarding the religious,
social, and political structures influencing episcopal elections that have
emerged from the papers collected in this volume and from recent re
search. It provides a general framework in which to situate the individual
papers and by indicating which routes have not been taken by the various
contributors, it also hopes to open up perspectives for future research.
Bishops, Local and Universal
In reality as well as in imagination, bishops were the pillars of the ancient
church. The rise of the monarchic episcopate in the third century created a
church structure which entrusted to a single bishop the ultimate authority
1 Notable examples are: D. Claude, Die Bestellung der Bischofe, ZRG 80, Kan. Abt.49,
1963; F. Letter, Designation und angebliches Kooptationsrecht bei Bischofserhebun-
gen, ZRG 90, Kan. Abt. 56, 1973, 112-150 ; R. Gryson, Les elections episcopates au
Illieme siecle, RHE 68, 1973, 353-404; Id., Les elections episcopales en Orient au
IVieme siecle, RHE 74, 1979: 301-344; Id., Les elections episcopales en Occident au
IVieme siecle, RHE 75, 1980, 257-283; J. Gaudemet, Les elections dans FEglise
Latine, des origines aux XVIe siecle, Paris 1979; E. Dassmann, Die Bischofsbestellung
in der friihen Kirche, in: Id., Amter und Dienste in den friihchristlichen Gemeinden,
Hereditas: Studien zur alten Kirchengeschichte 8, Bonn 1994, 190-211; F.-R. Erkens,
ed., Die friih- und hochmittelalterliche Bischofserhebung im europaischen Vergleich,
BAKG 48, Koln/ Weimar/ Wien 1998.
2 P. Norton, Episcopal Elections 250-600. Hierarchy and Popular Will in Late Antiqui
ty, Oxford 2007; P. Christophe, L election des eveques dans Feglise latine au premier
millenaire, Paris 2009; A. Thier, Hierarchie und Autonomic Regelungstraditionen
der Bischofsbestellung in der Geschichte des kirchlichen Wahlrechts bis 1140, Frank
furt am Main 2011.

Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity: Structures and Perspectives 3
in a local community.3 Traces of a more shared leadership can still be de
tected in Rome and Alexandria at the beginning of the fourth century.
The triumph of the monarchic episcopate in the fourth century refocused
church life on the bishop: whilst we have a wealth of information about
bishops, we know less about other clergy than we might hope.4 Late Anti
que accounts often focus on ideal bishops, who displayed spiritual authori
ty and fit into the modern category of 'holy men'.5 They were depicted as
the defenders of the local community against all sorts of evils and interces
sors with God. Yet not all bishops were saints: ecclesiastical histories are
full of stories of conflict and intrigue that sometimes cast their adversaries
in the role of evil-doers. Crucially, the saintly and the sinful cast a long
shadow over ordinary bishops, more or less competently directing their
diocese, who remain largely invisible.
The church was (and is) at once a local and universal institution. The
bishop hence incorporated both dimensions. Leaving aside the issue of the
decline of civic structures in Late Antiquity,6 it is largely correct to state
that local communities continued to maintain strong traditions and foster
loyalty and allegiance. From different perspectives, P. Blaudeau and E.
Watts have recently shown that local traditions and allegiances had an
important impact on the symbolic construction of power and a real influ
ence on events/ Local secular actors could also pursue their own interests
that could spur intervention in the church. But a bishop was also eminent
ly linked in with the church at large. He constituted the link with other
3 A. Faivre, Naissance d'une hierarchie: les premieres etapes du cursus clerical, Paris
1977; E. Dassmann, Zur Entstehung des Monepiskopats, JbAC 17, 1974, 74-90 (=
Id., Amter und Dienste [note 1] 49-74); G. Schollgen, From Monepiscopate to
Monarchical Episcopate: The Emergence of a New Relationship between Bishop and
Community in the Third Century, The Jurist 66, 2006, 114-128.
4 R. Godding, Pretres en Gaule merovingienne, Subsidia hagiographica 82, Brussels
2001; S. Hiibner, Der Klerus in Der Gesellschaft des Spatantiken Kleinasiens, Stutt
gart 2005; P. Delage, ed., Les Peres de l'Eglise et les ministeres : evolutions, ideal et
realites: actes du Hie Colloque de La Rochelle, 7, 8 et 9 septembre 2007, Jonzac 2008.
5 J.W. Drijvers/ J.W. Watt, eds., Portraits of Spiritual Authority: Religious Power in
Early Christianity, Byzantium and the Christian Orient, Religions in the Graeco-
Roman world 137, Leiden 1999; P. Brown, Poverty and Leadership in the Later Ro
man Empire, Menahem Stern Jerusalem Lectures, Hannover 2001; A. Sterk, Re
nouncing the World yet Leading the Church: the Monk-bishop in Late Antiquity,
Cambridge, Mass. 2004; C. Rapp, Holy Bishops in Late Antiquity: the Nature of
Christian Leadership in an Age of Transition, The Transformation of the Classical
Heritage 37, Berkeley 2005.
6 J.H.W.G. Liebeschuetz, Decline and Fall of the Roman City, Oxford 2001.
7 P. Blaudeau, Alexandrie et Constantinople (451-491). De l'histoire a la geo-
ecclesiologie, Rome 2006; E. Watts, Riot in Alexandria. Tradition and Group Dy
namics in Late Antique Pagan and Christian Communities, Berkeley 2010.

4 Peter Van Nuffelen - johan Leemans
churches, as he incarnated the universal church in his local community
and represented the local church within his province, either through cor
respondence or through his presence at synods. Fourth century Cappado-
cia and the correspondence of Basil of Caesarea offer a good example here.
Basil's correspondence was clearly "a strategy of communion" with the
bishops within and without his church province and it also contains a
substantial number of references to local synods.8
If the at once local and universal position of the bishop is one key
structure to understand episcopal elections, the implicit tension between
authority and consensus is the other one. A bishop possessed ultimate
authority in his community, but just as an ancient monarch was not (sup
posed to be) a dictator, the monarchic episcopate did not by definition
imply a top-down imposition of power. A bishop represented and to a
certain degree even incarnated his community: as we shall see, a bishop
was invested with the consensus of his community. Even if formal checks
and balances were largely absent, a bishop was supposed to steer his com
munity for the common good. He could forfeit his position when this was
not the case anymore, for example when Peter I of Alexandria was per
ceived as abandoning his flock during the Diocletian persecution.9 But a
bishop also had to be elected and rule with the consensus of the universal
church, i.e. with his peers. Their always existed a temptation for the bi
shops of the province or the metropolitan to impose a candidate of their
own choosing, in particular in periods of doctrinal strife. This authorita
tive imposition could, however, imperil the consensus, as (part of) the
local community could outrightly reject the new bishop or form a perma
nent opposition. To judge from the rich correspondence of Isidorus of
Pelusium, the latter seems to have been the case in Pelusium in the early
fifth century. The bishop Eusebius seems to have been a bad bishop: a
weak administrator, a corrupt person and also in religious matters far from
holy. Some of his clerics shared his unpastoral attitude, others however
criticised him sharply. The Letters of Isidorus document his attempts to
criticise and correct the behaviour of Eusebius and his gang as well as the
support he lent towards the victims of their way of doing.10
8 B. Gain, L'Eglisc de Cappadoce au IVe siecle d'apres la correspondance de Basile de
Cesaree (330-379), Oriental* Christiana analecta 225, Rome 1985; R. Pouchet, Basile
le Grand et son univers d'amis d'apres sa correspondance: une strategic de commu
nion, Studia ephemeridis Augustinianum 36, Rome 1992.
9 T. Vivian, St. Peter of Alexandria, Bishop and Martyr, Studies in Antiquity and
Christianity, Philadelphia, Pa. 1988, 20; H. Hauben, La premiere annee du schisme
melitien (305/306), AncSoc 20, 1989, 267-280.
10 P. Evieux, Isidore de Peluse, Theologie historique 99, Paris 1995, 206-241.

Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity: Structures and Perspectives 5
Many of the issues that come to the fore during episcopal elections can
be related to these two axes, the local and the universal, and authority and
consensus. As the bishop was both local and universal, episcopal elections
were a nexus where the universal and the local met, and occasions when
the competing demands of authority and consensus were played out. This
situation, as well as the obvious potential for conflict it generates, makes
the election of a bishop a complicated phenomenon to assess correctly, in
particular in a state of limited evidence. We just wish to draw attention
here to one important element. Given the nature of our sources, we are in
particular running the constant danger of underestimating the local di
mension. Episcopal elections were hugely important events for a commu
nity. We often tend to look at them from a disengaged and distant pers
pective, focusing on long-term developments, in particular regarding
histories of doctrinal conflicts. But for individual communities, the elec
tion of a new incumbent was of tremendous importance. Except for cases
of deposition or voluntary retirement, bishops held their position for life.
The tendency was to elect elder members of the community, first driven
by the authority of age but later enshrined in the clerical cursus honorum
in the West which ensured that one could hardly become a bishop before
the age of 45.11 Tenures were maybe shorter than one would expect in a
system with election for life, but could last long.12 Elections thus potential
ly determined the life of a community for many years to come. Individual
ambitions and faction rivalry within a city and a church were thus played
out at these occasions. This local context tends to be underestimated in
scholarship, where the focus is often on the macropolitical at the expense
of the micropolitical, on doctrinal conflicts and imperial strategy at the
expense of local tension.13 For lack of information on that context, many
elections remain obscure or we tend to focus on factors that can be more
easily detected, such as imperial intervention and doctrinal conflict. Al
though the evidence seldom allows us to really grasp that local dimension,
as even the papers in this volume show, we must be aware of it as a crucial
dimension and try to see how the universal and the local interact.
11 Siricius ep. 1.13 (PL 13.1142a-l 143a); Zos. ep. 9.5 (PL 672b-673a).
12 See the contribution by R. Van Dam in this volume.
13 For attempts to correct that perspective, see P. Van Nuffelen, Episcopal Succession in
Sixth Century Sicily, in: D. Engels, ed., Zwischen Ideal und Wirklichkeit - Herr-
schaft auf Sizilien von der Antike bis zur Friihen Neuzeit, Stuttgart 2010, 175-190
and Episcopal Succession in Constantinople (381-450 C.E.): The Local Dynamics of
Power, JECS 18,2010,425-451.

6 Peter Van Nuffelen - johan Leemans
Current Approaches
Seeing episcopal elections as a nexus of the local and universal and of au
thority and consensus, may, we hope, help us to grasp better their com
plexities. We are obviously not the first to argue that elections were impor
tant and complex. In this section, we wish to sketch briefly three larger
tendencies in scholarship.
Earlier research on elections in the ancient church was often driven by
contemporary issues: Catholic scholars have implicitly or explicitly tied
their research on ancient episcopal elections into debates about the nature
of the modern church and its hierarchical institutions.14 Unsurprisingly,
many of them focus on the role played by the local community and laity,
and it comes not as a surprise that R. Gryson linked the elaboration of a
hierarchical church in the fourth century with a decline of the real impact
of the laity.15 The recent monograph by Peter Norton has explicitly chal
lenged that view and argues that the people continued to play a role until
the end of Antiquity. Such schematic assessments may not do justice to
the evidence,16 and moreover, it may be misleading to focus just on the
role of the people and the issue of their "real" influence. As we argue be
low, episcopal elections must be seen as consensus-seeking phenomena
that played out in a complex social environment. There does not seem to
be a fixed procedure for running an election and organising, for example, a
formal vote. Rather, the finding of a consensus could be informal, which
later was publicly approved of by acclamations. The extent to which the
people had a say in such a process is hard to measure. In an ideal consen
sual election there is no conflict of opinion and hardly a need to express a
view. It is rather in contested elections that one can see that the people
could indeed reject certain candidates or vocally (or militarily) support one
particular candidate. But these were situations when consensus was not
achieved and the different actors had to manifest their own will. The issue
of popular involvement thus needs to be set in a wider context and not
studied as an isolated element.
Second, canon lawyers have had a long standing interest in episcopal
elections, often with the aim of reconstructing the antecedents for current
practice.17 This has, however, lead to a projection of a systematizing view
of canon law back on Antiquity: most work has focused on establishing
14 Gaudemet, Les elections (note 1) and Christophe, l'election (note 2).
15 Gryson, Les elections (note 1).
16 For a much more differentiated picture, see Thier, Hierarchie (note 2), 194.
17 With Thier, Hierarchie (note 2), we have now a new synthesis that can function as a
guide to previous scholarship.

Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity: Structures and Perspectives 7
the procedure for elections in Late Antiquity. Although earlier scholars
obviously took into account regional variation and change over time, they
have tended to overestimate the regulatory character of ancient canons and
often attempted to detect a linear development. Both aspects are chal
lenged in this volume,18 which suggests a more dynamic view of canon
law. Canon law is not a neutral resource laying down the rules for elec
tions in Late Antiquity, but part of the various factors that played a role
during the process and that could be highlighted or downplayed depend
ing on the circumstances.
Finally, the application of prosopographical methods to Late Antiqui
ty has raised the issue of the social background of clergy and bishops in
general. The traditional issue at stake here is the degree of continuity be
tween the old, secular elite, and the new Christian one. It is now clear that
most bishops were drawn from the curial class, with relatively few bishops
drawn from the humiliores or the senatorial class.19 There are individual
exceptions, of which Ambrose is the best known, and geographical ones,
with Gaul in the fifth and sixth century as the prime example.20 Whilst the
church was thus not a refuge for the top elite in an age of decline, it is not
the case either that the local municipal elite simply espoused clerical office:
evidence for Italy shows that more than half of the bishops did not origi
nate from the city they governed. In the words of Claire Sotinel: "Se de-
gage l'image dune institution avant tout soucieuse de se doter de cadres
efficaces pour son gouvernement interne plus que dune Eglise confondue
avec la hierarchie sociale de son epoque."21 The evidence from the early
Byzantine empire, however, has been taken to indicate a greater degree of
18 A. Thier, Dynamische Schriftlichkeit: Zur Normenbildung in den vor-gratianischen
Kanonessammlungen, ZSSKA 124, 2007, 1-33 and his contribution in this volume
focus on the dynamics of late antique dealing with written sources of law, whereas P.
Van Nuffelen emphasises the rhetorical function of canon law.
19 F.D. Gilliard, The Social Origins of Bishops in the Fourth Century, Diss. Berkeley
1966; W. Eck, Der Einfluss der konstantinischen Wende auf die Auswahl der Bischo-
fe im 4. und 5. Jahrhundert, Chiron 8, 1978, 561-585; C. Sotinel, Le personnel epis
copal: enquete sur la puissance de l'eveque dans la cite, in: E. Rebillard/ C. Sotinel,
edd., L'eveque dans la cite du IVe au Ve siecle: image et autorite, Rome 1998, 105-
126 and Ead., Les eveques italiens dans la societe de l'Antiquite tardive: emergence
d'une nouvelle elite?, in: R. Lizzi, ed., Le trasformazioni delle elites in eta tardoantica,
Perugia 2006, 377-404; C. Rapp, The Elite Status of Bishops in Late Antiquity, Are-
thusa 33, 2000, 379-399.
20 M. Heinzelmann, Bischofsherrschaft in Gallien: zur Kontinuitat romischer Fiihrungs-
schichten vom 4. bis zum 7. Jahrhundert: soziale, prosopographische und bildungsge-
schichtlicheAspekte, Munich 1976.
21 C. Sotinel, Le recrutement des eveques en Italie aux IVe et Ve siecles. Essai d'enquete
prosopographique, in: Vescovi e pastori in epoca teodosiana, Studia Ephemeridis Au-
gustinianum 58, Rome 1997, 193-204, 202.

8 Peter Van Nuffelen - johan Leemans
continuity.22 Local diversity is thus again evident, but even so it seems fair
to state that the clerical elite is not a mere avatar of the age-old elites: it
marked a true mutation in the social and political history, even if bishops
started to model their behaviour on that of secular rulers.23 This does not
mean, however, that social hierarchies played no role at all within the
church and that the church was the great avenue for social promotion
from sharecropper to bishop. An elite background was an obvious boon
when pursuing a career in the church.
Whilst engaging with these debates, this volume hopes to inspire fur
ther discussion by proposing a number of new perspectives. As said, one of
the aims of the volume is to demonstrate the sheer variety of cases and
Procedure and Consensus
We must start by confessing our ignorance in an important respect. The
information we have, and in particular the canon rules, is mostly con
cerned with the proper preconditions of the ordination, and not with the
actual designation of the candidate.24 Some aspects of the designation were
formalized at some point in time. Justinian,2' probably preceded by Anas-
tasius,26 formalised the rule that a shortlist of three candidates should be
drawn up from which the new bishop could be selected and stated that the
clergy and the leading citizens should be involved. The ancient focus on
ordination is an important fact, as modern interest tends to regard desig
nation and election. Indeed, the present volume discusses episcopal elec
tions, i.e. the process resulting in the appointment of a new incumbent, in
its wider social, ecclesiastical and political context. In the relative disregard
for the actual ordination this betrays a modern perspective on episcopal
elections: what is important for us, is what happens before the ordination,
the correct procedure or the kowtowing and back-stabbing. The actual
ordination is often seen by us as the merely ceremonial endpoint of that
22 M. Whittow, Ruling the Late Roman and Early Byzantine City: A Continuous Histo
ry, Past and Present 129, 1990, 3-29; A. Laniado, Recherches sur les notables munici
pals dans l'empire protobyzantin, Rome 2002, 151-4, 253.
23 R. Haensch, Die Rolle der Bischofe im 4. jahrhundert. Neue Anforderungen und
Neue Antworten, Chiron 37, 2007, 153-182.
24 Norton, Episcopal Elections (note 2), 31 and G. Dunn in this volume.
25 Codex Iustianianus 1.3.41 (528) (CIC(B).C, 26 Kriiger); Novellae 123 (546) and 137
(565) (CIC(B).N 594-595, 696-697 Scholl/Kroll).
26 Severus Select Letters, 1, 39 (Vol. 1/1, 124 Brooks; Vol. 2/1, 111 Brooks), with Nor
ton, Episcopal Elections (note 2), 37 and F. Alpi in this volume.

Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity: Structures and Perspectives 9
process. The ancient church did not see it that way. The ordination is not
just the moment when God's spirit is imparted on the new bishop. As the
ordination is performed by neighbouring bishops and, possibly, by the
metropolitan, it is also the moment when the local community is inserted
anew into the universal church and when the local community and the
universal church express their shared wish to see a particular individual as
the new bishop. Ordination was thus the key moment and many examples
show that in disputed elections one of the factions would rush to ordina
tion to forestall the other candidate. Disputes were often about improper
ordinations. In other words, there was no point such as the official proc
lamation of the results during modern elections which determines the
official outcome, followed in due course by the installation of a new presi
dent or government. In episcopal elections, up until the ordination every
thing was open.
This fact should direct us away from seeing, consciously or uncons
ciously, modern electoral procedures in our democracies or modes of de
signation in the modern churches as paradigms. Given the position of the
bishop as the incarnation of the community and its link with the universal
church, the election of a bishop was eminently consensual. As an expres
sion of the communal consensus, an election could not ignore a consti-
tuant part of the community. The people thus always had some role to
play. One cannot draw one straight line in the development of church law
on elections: A. Thier argues that western canon law tends to attribute a
more important role to bishops from the fourth century onwards, but
from the fifth the laity again receives more emphasis. The argument for a
linear decline of the people's influence should thus be nuanced.27 This
does not mean that the people always played a decisive role, or even an
important role: often the vox populi may have been rather pro forma.28
Evidence from Constantinople in the early fifth century suggests that the
role of the people could be decisive in cases of disputed elections when the
church and secular hierarchy could not agree on a candidate.29 Most im
portantly, however, the people could reject a bishop who was imposed on
them, a situation that does not seem to have been that uncommon.30 Here
one notices that the local and the universal church had to agree. Just as the
theoretical and actual role of the people varied over time and from place to
27 Gryson, Les elections episcopates en Orient (note 5), 302-4; Rapp, Holy Bishops
(note 1), 200.
28 On these lines, for a later period, see B. Moulet, Intervention des laics et regulation
ecclesiastique des nominations episcopales a Byzance (Vlll-Xe siecles), Revue beige de
philologie et d'histoire 85, 2007, 213-221.
29 Van Nuffelen, Episcopal Succession in Constantinople (note 13).
30 Norton, Episcopal Elections (note 2), 44-5 and J. Rist in this volume.

10 Peter Van Nuffelen - johan Leemans
place, consensus could be achieved in a variety of ways: proposing a candi
date and allowing him to be scrutinised; drawing up a list of three and
have one selected; having candidates acclaimed.
One has to take account of the onus of consensus. In a modern elec
tion, one can be declared a clear winner with just over fifty percent of the
vote or, depending on the electoral system, even less. In an episcopal elec
tion that would not have been sufficient. Canon 6 of Nicaea presumes the
necessity of consensus among all provincial bishops, even when allowing
for some form of majority decision: "If all have come to a harmonious
agreement according to the ecclesiastical rule and two or three disagree for
reasons of private rivalry, the wish of the majority is to prevail." This vo
lume chronicles sufficient instances when a minority succeeded in block
ing the election of the bishop of the other faction or the majority could
push through its will only at great cost. The highly disputed nature of
episcopal elections is thus not just due to the ecclesiastical and political
importance of the function, but also to the high demands of consensus.
The high stock set by consensus is best reflected in hagiographical
sources. Lives of saints are frustrating sources if one wishes to use them as
historical sources. They tend to gloss over all the more wordly concerns
that seem important to us and presents a rather irenic picture of the uni
versal wish of a community for a saintly individual as bishop. But the
emphasis on consensus, including that of the people, reveals the ideologi
cal focus on agreement of all, including the people. Indeed, Merovingian
lives of saints attest to popular participation in a region and at a time
when many elections seem determined by royal decree.31 The focus on
consensus also allows to circumvent the difficulties faced by individuals:
Sulpicius' Life of Saint Martin hints at the opposition of the hierarchy to
Martin's election, but depicts the choice as a divinely inspired action of
the people. The disgruntled bishops are marginalised in the suggestion of a
wide consensus.32
State Intervention and Ecclesiastical Conflict
Bishops are elected in a specific society and context. Two crucial factors
need to be singled out, imperial intervention and ecclesiastical conflict.
That the secular state and the emperor (and later, in the West, the
king) intervened needs no discussion, but it is worth raising two interre-
31 See the contribution by D.Alt.
32 Sulp. Sev. V. Martin 9 (ed. J. Fontaine, Vie de Saint Martin. Sources chretiennes 135,
Paris 1969).

Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity: Structures and Perspectives 11
lated issues: how often and where did he intervene, and on what legal
grounds did he do so? A traditional view would ascribe to the emperor an
overriding and direct influence on episcopal elections, directly on the ma
jor sees and indirectly on the minor ones.33 Justification for this was found
in a legal stewardship of the emperor over the church,34 often traced back
to Eusebius' depiction of Constantine as "bishop of those outside" or the
heritage of the position of pontifex maximus,35
Such a view of imperial competence and intervention in episcopal
elections now seems on the wane. In a recent paper, J. Dijkstra and G.
Greatrex have revisited the relationship between Anastasius and the pa
triarchs of Constantinople to show that the patriarchs, especially when
they aligned themselves with the people, were powerful individuals who
could effectively challenge the emperor,36 In a study of episcopal succes
sion in Constantinople under the Theodosian dynasty P. Van Nuffelen
has argued that the emperor had to take into account the views and power
of an ecclesiastical establishment, which succeeded in controlling succes
sion in the capital for most of the first half of the fifth century, against
contestation by the johannites and imperial intervention,37 His interven
tion may have been less frequent than we assume, mainly limiting it to
cases when no consensus was reached.
In the context of this volume it is striking that no contribution to this
volume deals mainly with imperial and regal intervention - except for the
papers by B. Dumezil and C. Nicolaye, both arguing against overestimat
ing its importance. This is a sign that the earlier emphasis on imperial
intervention as the crucial element in late antique elections is in the
process of being corrected, and that, as we shall see, attention is being
shifted to intra-ecclesiastical motifs and agents. This shift of focus should
not lead to a neglect of the role of the secular elite, nor to a failure to con
ceptualise imperial intervention. Yet the argument that imperial interven
tion is related to a legal privilege reflects a tendency to analyse modes of
conduct in legal terms, whereas ancient practice was much more messy.
More importantly, even if the emperor may have understood himself as
33 Gryson, Les elections episcopates en Orient (note 1), 345-7, nuanced by Norton,
Episcopal elections (note 2), 82.
34 F. L. Ganshof, Note sur Election des eveques dans l'cmpirc romain au IVme et pen
dant la premiere moitie du Vieme siecle, RIDA 4, 1950, (^Melanges Fernand de
Visscher 3), 407-498; B. Biondi, II diritto romano cristiano, Milan 1952, 203-230; P.
G. Caron, ^intervention de l'autorite imperial romain dans l'election des eveques,
Revue de droit canonique 27, 1978, 76-83.
35 Eus.v.c.4.24.
36 J. Dijkstra and G. Greatrex, 'Patriarchs and Politics in Constantinople in the Reign of
Anastasius (with a reedition of O.Mon.Epiph. 59)', Millenium 6, 2009, 223-264.
37 Van Nuffelen, Episcopal Succession in Constantinople (note 13).

12 Peter Van Nuffelen - johan Leemans
having a right of overview, this was in the period we are concerned with
never conceptualised as such by the emperor. On the contrary, even in a
region and a period where appointment by the emperor was the rule, Me
rovingian Gaul, councils did reassert the ecclesiastical privilege of appoint
ing a bishop. As B. Dumezil points out, royal intervention always re
mained beyond legal conceptualisation and affirmation of ecclesiastical
autonomy regularly took place. His proposal to analyse the existing prac
tice as an informal system on its own, without trying to root it in a specific
legal justification, succeeds in showing that the system could be stable and
functioning while the church could keep alive the idea of its own autono
my and reassert it in certain circumstances. Moreover, as an informal sys
tem, each appointment marked the renegotiation of the relationship be
tween king and church: the king was supposed to comply with implicit
expectations, such as the importance of moderation and the duty of res
ponding adequately to the circumstances. Conflict arose when king or
church failed to honour their part of the implicit agreement.
These recent approaches rely on the public dimension of elections in
arguing that bishops could play out popular support against the emperor
or that the king had to be seen as guaranteeing the implicit moral codes of
expected behaviour. They thus back away from a strictly legal perspective.
It is this public dimension that may also help to explain another pheno
menon: the recurrence of violence and riots during elections.38 It may be
fruitful to situate the presence of riots during episcopal elections against
the background of widespread local violence and riots throughout Later
Antiquity. Attempts have been made to explain late antique violence as a
specifically Christian phenomenon spurred by the rise of the bishop,39 but
given the extensive presence of city violence throughout the empire, not
just for religious causes, this is not entirely convincing: riots and violence
need to be related to the changed nature of local city life, in which Chris
tianity obviously played a role but was far from the only factor.40 It may,
in turn, be reductive to state that the street battles for the episcopal see in
38 It is most explicitly discussed in the paper of F. Fatti.
39 R. MacMullen, Changes in the Roman Empire. Essays in the Ordinary, Princeton,
1990, 205-276; P. Brown, Power and Persuasion in Late Antiquity. Towards a Chris
tian Empire, Madison, Wi. 1992, 85-95.
40 For a social perspective on late antique religious riots, see J. Hahn, Gewalt und religio-
ser Konflikt: Studien zu den Auseinandersetzungen zwischen Christen, Heiden und
Juden im Osten des Romischen Reiches (von Konstantin bis Theodosius II.), Berlin
2004. A sketch of a more integrated approach is laid out by M. Whitby, Factions, Bi
shops, Violence and Urban Decline, in: J.-U. Krause/ C. Witschel, eds., Die Stadt in
der Spatantike - Niedergang oder Wandel?, Stutggart 2006, 441-461.

Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity: Structures and Perspectives 13
fourth-century Rome were just a mutated form of traditional patronage41
- a version of the thesis of social continuity between secular and ecclesias
tical elites. If, however, we see episcopal elections as essentially public
events, it becomes more understandable that violence could erupt when no
consensus was reached, especially if this was happening in a society where
local violence was common. Imperial intervention, in turn, often had the
basic aim of maintaining order or forestalling disorder.
What this volume leaves in obscurity and has, to our knowledge, re
ceived no in-depth study recently, is how the legislation of Justinian im
pacted on the actual recruitment of clergy and bishops in the East. It is,
for example, noteworthy that the so-called Dialogue of Political Science
favours a system of state appointment for bishops.42 The role of bishops
within the state was clearly being reconsidered at the time, and it would be
worthwhile to study the aims, effectiveness, and impact of Justinian's
laws.43 This is an occasion when the interaction of internal church life and
external state influence could be very well grasped.
If the influence of the emperor is being cut down to realistic propor
tions, what are the intra-ecclesiastical factors that the contributions to this
volume draw attention to? Elections were occasions when ecclesiastical
networks of support and patronage could be built up. Bishops tended to
staff their clergy with friends and relations,44 which translates in the emer
gence of episcopal dynasties, such as that of John and Domnus in Antioch,
and Theophilus and Cyril in Alexandria. But bishops did not remain fo
cused on their own sees: they would try to install like-minded individuals
on vacant sees across the province, and sometimes even beyond the bor
ders of a province. Given the importance of synodal decisions, having the
numbers on one's side could be very advantageous. This strategy is partic
ularly visible in times of doctrinal tension and is documented in this vo
lume in particular for the patriarchate of Antioch: Theodoretus of Cyr
overstepped his authority by intervening in Tyre,45 as did the patriarch of
Alexandria with the election of Paul the Black (564).46 Elections could
thus be vicarious battle grounds for wider conflicts, and this often led to
the conscious overstepping of accepted procedure.
41 The most explicit statement of this position is R. Lizzi, Discordia in urbe: pagani e
cristiani in rivolta, in: F.E. Consolino, ed., Pagani e cristiani da Giuliano l'Apostata al
saccodi Roma, Messina 1995, 115-140.
42 P. Bell, Three Political Voices from the Age of Justinian, Liverpool 2009, 159.
43 Norton, Episcopal Elections (note 2), 34-6 46-7 has a brief discussion.
44 Blaudeau,Alexandrie(note7),17.
45 See the contributions by Alpi, Bevan, and Keough.
46 See the paper by P. Allen. See also D. I. Viezure's contribution.

14 Peter Van Nuffelen - johan Leemans
As the following or not-following of procedure itself was not sufficient
to make an election accepted or not, such battles spurred legitimizing
discourses that justified overstepping canonical prescriptions or obscured
infractions of accepted practice. This can be particularly well documented
in Rome, where bishops modelled their self-understanding on that of the
Roman state and used the legal vocabulary that depicted the incumbent as
the inheritor of an unbroken tradition of orthodoxy.47 But also for Alex
andria such justificatory discourses can be well studied.48 One of the as
pects this volume wants to draw attention to is the symbolic dimension
present in elections: by this we do not mean the theological dimension of
the imparting of spiritual authority on a bishop as the representative of
Christ in his bishopric, but rather the series of actions and symbols that
justified the position of a particular bishop by setting him in a tradition
and depicting him as the heir to that tradition. Such symbols were impor
tant. In Egypt the custom existed of putting the hand of the dead pa
triarch on the head of the new incumbent, or of performing the ordina
tion in presence of the corpse. This was not an action that was performed
in every instance, but it was part of the collective memory and could be
drawn upon if need be.49 Conversely, since Paul the Tabennesiote in 538,
diphysite bishops of Alexandria were ordained in Constantinople, which
was an obvious symbolic disadvantage. This symbolic dimension needs to
be further integrated in discussions of episcopal elections. Indeed, instead
of understanding popular acclamations as a way of voting (hence giving
rise to the debate whether the people had any real influence or not), it is
possible to see them as the symbolic underwriting of an election, i.e. an
expression of the consensus. This needs not, however, exclude the possibil
ity of a real popular influence in specific circumstances.
Ecclesiastical conflict, understood in a sociological sense of the estab
lishment of factions and parties that compete for influence, thus emerges
as a basic factor in elections. But it was a long-term process: unless one
opted for the radical but difficult way of deposing a whole series of bi
shops, episcopal sees became vacant one by one and each election re
quested a lot of effort to make it turn the right way. Gains were not always
long-term, as the succession of the Cyrillian Rabulla by the nestorian Ibas
in Edessa (435) shows.50 Another complicating factor was that depositions
for doctrinal reasons, sometimes but not always hardened by exile,51 and
47 See the contributions by C. Hornung and D. McOmish.
48 See P. Blaudeaus chapter.
49 A, is shown by E.Wipszycka in her chapter.
50 See the paper of C. Rammelt.
51 See P. Blaudeau/ F. Prevot, eds., Exil et relegation, les tribulations du sage et du saint
dans FAntiquite romaine et chretienne (He avt-VIe s. ap. J.-C), Paris 2008.

Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity: Structures and Perspectives 15
elections of new incumbents were often contested. Bishops often refused
to accept their deposition, which could lead to the splitting of communi
ties, each with their own bishop. Examples range from the Melitian schism
in the early fourth century to Antioch throughout the longest part of the
same century. It is exemplified in this volume by Pauline Allen's prosopo-
graphical analysis of succession in sixth century Antioch. Reconciliation
implied finding a compromise that integrated the various bishops; the
failure in the cases of both the Melitians and the fourth-century Antio-
chean schism illustrate eloquently the difficulties involved.52 In line with
earlier research,53 this volume thus draws attention to the sociological
process of factionalism that overlaps in important ways with doctrinal
strife, and often is driven by it, but is not always fully coterminous with it.
Other internal factors are also considered in this volume. One could
be termed 'disciplining'. The development of the church into a respectable
institution of power obviously increased the numbers of bishoprics availa
ble. Although R. Van Dam's admittedly speculative calculations suggest
there might actually have been twice as many senators as bishops at any
given time in the empire, this also increased the need for qualified person
nel. The development of a cursus, which only allowed one to become
bishop at the age of 45, reduced in a natural way the number of candidates
for a particular see, given the lower life expectancy of that period. D.
Hunter, in turn, focuses on the condition of having been married only
once and how this rule contributed to the establishment of priestly celiba
cy. He also questions the often stated preference for monks as bishops and
he draws attention to the rather critical view of monks as bishops that also
seems to have existed.
Centre and Periphery
We stated at the outset that this volume maps variety and difference. Here
it may be important to expand our perspective to episcopal succession:
rather than looking at individual elections, regional variety is better de
tected by looking at succession patterns generated by a series of elections.
Indeed, elections are often the only instances that are discussed in the
sources for a given see, and thus good occasions to get an insight in the
make-up of different churches. In general, it may be possible to state that
52 On Antioch, see the paper by O. Hihn.
53 Cf. D.M. Gwynn, The Eusebians: The Polemic of Athanasius of Alexandria and the
Construction of the 'Arian Controversy, Oxford 2007.

16 Peter Van Nuffelen - johan Leemans
the form of episcopal succession depended on the structure of the local
ecclesiastical community and on that of the society in which it took root.
The classic image of a bishop residing in a city is only applicable to the
church within the Roman empire: for the peoples beyond the frontiers,
bishops were regularly appointed to entire regions or peoples.54 Goths and
other Germanic peoples usually had only one bishop assigned to them,
who followed them in their travels. Hence for a long time Vandal and
Visigothic bishops resided at court and were not assigned to cities. For the
Visigoths this seems to have happened only in the reign of Leovigild (572-
86).55 The bishops in Armenia, in turn, resided on the large estates of the
magnates of that kingdom.56 This situation is comprehensible against the
background of the slow integration of barbarian and Roman societies in
the successor kingdoms and the specific urban (or non-urban) make-up of
non-Roman societies. But even within the empire not all bishops were
city-based. Leaving aside the phenomenon of chorepiskopoi, bishops as
signed to villages within a diocese and under the authority of the local
bishop, bishops could also reside in monasteries, for example in Egypt in
the sixth century when rival factions had their own bishops and only one
of them occupied the city.57
Even within the Roman empire, we should not take the link between
city and bishop as too self-evident or, better, we should not imagine the
"city" as too big or too important a place. Surely bishops in the bigger
cities of the Empire are best-documented but this should not make us
forget that bishops often resided in not much more than villages. Gregory
of Nazianze's Sasima, his cursed station in the middle of nowhere that
comes immediately to mind, may be considered an exception but Nyssa,
where that other luminary of Cappadocian theology resided, was not all
too big a city to judge from the size of the martyr's shrine he describes in
his Letter 25. And what to think of the 500 or more bishopsrics in North
ern Africa? Many of these bishops must have had their see in smaller cities,
just as one can easily imagine that not all of these bishops were well-
educated, well-to-do people of good descent. Thus, just as the social make
up of these small cities must have been different from that of provincial
capitals, not to mention cities like Alexandria, elections may well have run
a different course there from what we know from bigger cities.
54 Ruf., h.c. I 9-10 on Iberia and Ethiopia; Prosper Tiro, Chronicon s.a. 431 on the
Scots.
55 R.W. Mathisen, Barbarian Bishops and the Churches "in barbaricis gentibus" during
Late Antiquity, Speculum 72, 1997, 664-697.
56 See the contribution by A. Mardirossian.
57 The evidence is set out in the paper of E. Wipszycka.

Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity: Structures and Perspectives 17
If the paradigm of the city-based bishop may be too much at the fore
front of our analysis, so is the idea of a single mode of episcopal succession
in Late Antiquity. Many analyses take the model set out in the canons of
the church as the standard one and then apply it to the various groups. It
can be shown, however, that some sects made conscious choices for differ
ent modes of succession: the Novatians in Constantinople developed a
tightly controlled system of succession in which elite background and
blood ties were of paramount importance. The short-lived Eunomian
hierarchy was exceptional in assigning only one or a few bishops to entire
regions and by making the bishops subservient to the twin spiritual head
of the groups, Eunomius and Aetius, who did not become part of the
Eunomian episcopal system. Both can be related to the specific social situ
ation these sects found themselves in, and in the case of the Eunomians
theological considerations.58 It has been suggested that the Melitians con
tinued the ancient Egyptian practice of having communities directed by
presbyters.59 In a context of cultural and communal diversity, different
bishops could co-exist in the same city.60 Such variety may have been re
duced in the course of the centuries, but these examples at least show that
it existed and they suggest that differences in succession patterns may re
flect differences in social outlook and structure of specific churches, or
even distinct theological choices. After all, a bishop is a leader of a com
munity and the way he exercises his power is related to the self-
understanding and make-up of that community.
Obviously, it would be naive to simply claim local variety without see
ing that certain places and models exercised a greater influence than oth
ers. In particular, patriarchal sees - well represented in this volume -
sought to control the local churches by trying to shape succession. De
pending on geographical location and the strength of local traditions,
some communities aligned themselves faster with the centre than others.
Certain regions long remained properly peripheral in ecclesiastical terms:
the churches of Armenia and Persia, for example, were long subjected to
metropolitans within the Roman empire. Indeed, the abandonment of the
obligation to have the new Armenian catholicos ordained in Caesarea in
Cappadocia marked an important step in the autonomy of the Armenian
church61 and was a clear refusal to remain an appendix to the church of
the Roman empire. Being peripheral was also not without its advantages,
as it could protect against centralising tendencies by powerful metropoli-
58 Van Nuffelen, Episcopal Succession in Constantinople (note 13).
59 E. Wipszycka, The Origins of Monarchic Episcopate in Egypt, Adamantius 12, 2006,
71-90.
60 As noted in the paper of P. Bruns.
61 See the papers by A. Mardirossian, O. Shchuryk and P. Bruns.

18 Peter Van Nuffelen - johan Leemans
tans Gregory the Great, for example, could not unseat Maximus of Salona
when the latter outbid in 592 or 593 Gregory's favourite candidate. Salo
na was beyond the reach of Gregory's authority.62 Such examples should
warn against studying episcopal elections just from the perspective of the
emperor or the metropolitan. Local forces could thwart the desires of the
centre.63
Ideal and Reality
Finally, it is apposite to make a case in favour of the singularly unex
pected: stories of individual actions that give us pause to think and make
one hesitant to look for master-narratives to understand episcopal elec
tions. What to think of a person such as Martinianus? Serving as presbyter
under Eusebius of Pelusium (whose predecessor had refused to ordain
him!), he was one of his accomplices in a life of luxury, weak and immoral
leadership, abd financial abuse, exemplified in prefering a luxurious
church over the temple of the body of the poor. After a few years of ill-
conduct, this man took the money destined for the poor and travelled to
Alexandria in order to buy an episcopal see. To judge from church canons
warning for practices of simony with regard to episcopal elections, well-
attested for Merovingian Gaul,64 Martinianus' attempt of buying an epi
scopal office was not a unique event. More exceptional maybe was the
experience of vicarious shame and irritation Augustine experienced when
his congregation reacted overly enthusiast on the occasion of the visit of
Pinianus and Melania the Younger on their way to the Holy Land: in
church his congregation tried to exhort this incredible wealthy man to
accept the priesthood in their congregation, obviously in view of a future
appointment as bishop.65 Wealth obviously was an important element to
be considered a good candidate to the episcopacy. Paideia, culture and a
good network were important for the big sees. The succession in Constan
tinople to the disappointing and disappointed Gregory of Nazianzus was a
case in point: after this little-skilled diplomat a non-baptised senator, Nec-
tarius, was chosen and became per saltum bishop of one of the most im
portant sees of the Empire. Yet, these were exceptions and in the image of
the ideal bishop piety was at least as important is paideia. In the Apostolic
62 See, e.g., Greg. Magn. en. I 10, 19-20, IX 150, 152, 154-156, 159, 177-179, 231,
234,237(CCsL140,D.Norberg).
63 Van Nuffelen, Episcopal Succession in Sicily (note 13).
64 See the paper by S. Loftus.
65 Aug. ep. 125-128 (CSEL 44, A. Goldbacher).

Episcopal Elections in Late Antiquity: Structures and Perspectives 19
Constitutions (2.1.2) it is said that the candidate-bishop should be edu
cated if possible, but if he were to be uneducated, that he should have
experience in reading the Bible, be of suitable age and maturity. In other
words: functional and basic knowledge were important but spiritual edu
cation and leadership skills were considered more important. Other nor
mative texts about the ideal bishop66 also explore the tension between
piety and paideia: a bishop should have paideia but not too visible and he
certainly should not show off. Ultimately piety was considered more im
portant. In practice, however, Christians (and, if need be, non-Christians)
were very happy to ask the bishop for a letter of support or an intervention
in a difficult situation. These images of the ideal bishop, construed in
hagiographical literature67 or by bishops themselves,68 had no direct relev
ance on individual episcopal elections but it is not illogical to assume that
such images influenced how bishops and bishops-to-be behaved and how
their congregations expected them to behave.
Conclusion
The foregoing discussion could be taken to suggest that we advocate a
series of microstudies that describe the interplay of imperial intervention,
ecclesiastical conflict, and local circumstances for each specific election and
that a more general account is firmly beyond our reach. Whilst we do
caution against generalisations from specific instances that are too easily
taken as representing the standard, such a conclusion is too sceptical. This
introduction has pointed to a series of structural factors that can give
shape to a future synthesis. That is the modest aim of this voluminous
collection: to take a step back to take stock of the sheer variety and to
explore possible approaches so as to provide crucial building blocks for a
future synthesis.
66 E.g. Greg.Nys., ep. 19 and the texts discussed by J. Maxwell in this volume.
67 See the papers by D. Alt and R. Dekker.
68 See T.D. Barnes and J.A. van Waarden in this volume.

Keynote Lectures

Episcopal Succession in Antioch in the Sixth Century1
Pauline Allen
Background
Episcopal succession in Antioch in the sixth century has to be seen in the
context of imperial attempts at ecclesiastical unity in Late Antiquity, typi
fied by the publication of the Henoticon (Instrument of Union) by em
peror Zeno in 482, which was the forerunner of the "Second Henoticon
of emperor Justin II (571?), and of the Ekthesis of emperor Heraclius
(638).2
However, apart from the raging debate about Chalcedon, which was
influential in episcopal elections in sixth-century Antioch, we have to give
serious consideration to the march of tritheist doctrine, which could have
lain behind several episcopal elections and demises. Tritheism emerged
among anti-Chalcedonians in about 557 from an attempt to establish a
one-nature trinitarian doctrine on the basis of the christological terminol
ogy of Severus of Antioch. It spread rapidly and was early in vogue in
Syria. The opponents of this doctrine, both pro- and anti-Chalcedonians,
were as vociferous as its adherents, thus causing further turbulence among
anti-Chalcedonians and engaging the attention of Chalcedonian bishops
1 The following abbreviations are used in this paper: Allen, Evagrius = P. Allen, Eva-
grius Scholasticus the Church Historian, Spicilegium Sacrum Lovaniense, Etudes et
Documents 41, Leuven 1981; CPG = Clavis Patrum Graecorum; Downey, History of
Antioch = G. Downey, A History of Antioch in Syria from Seleucus to the Arab Con
quest, Princeton 1961; Frend, Rise of the Monophysite Movement = W.H.C. Frend,
The Rise of the Monophysite Movement. Chapters in the History of the Church in
the Fifth and Sixth Centuries, Cambridge 1972; Grillmeier, Jesus der Christus 2/3 =
A. Grillmeier, Jesus der Christus im Glauben der Kirche 2/3. Die Kirchen von Jerusa
lem und Antiochien, ed. T. Hainthaler, Freiburg 2002; Honigmann, Eveques et eve-
ches = E. Honigmann, Eveques et eveches monophysites d'Asie anterieure au Vie
siecle, CSCO.Sub 127, vol. 2, Louvain 1951; Norton, Episcopal Elections = P. Nor
ton, Episcopal Elections 250-600. Hierarchy and Popular Will in Late Antiquity, Ox
ford 2007.
2 A detailed comparison of these edicts is a desideratum.

24 Pauline Allen
in the East,3 who realised that, as long as the anti-Chalcedonians remained
divided among themselves on the question of tritheism, unity between
adherents and opponents of Chalcedonian was impossible. Tritheism was
one of the factors which troubled the nexus between Antioch and Alexan
dria on the anti-Chalcedonian side. Another important consideration on
this point was the large number of exiled anti-Chalcedonian bishops and
clergy who sought refuge in Egypt after 518, making the region a centre of
the anti-Chalcedonian cause. I shall therefore be devoting some time to
the relationship between the Syrian and Egyptian churches and its influ
ence on episcopal succession in Antioch.
In this paper I shall also try to address Norton's lack of attention to
case-studies and to the role which monks played in episcopal succession by
concentrating on fifteen case-studies of patriarchal succession in sixth-
century Antioch.4 This prosopographical approach will enable us better to
determine trends and influences in a particular region over a hundred-year
period,5 rather than extrapolating across different regions and periods, as
Norton does. I study these episcopal successions under the following ru
brics: origin, curriculum vitae, circumstances of election, demise, sources, and
literature. I include mentions of the mostly peaceful deaths of patriarchs
3 On tritheism see H. Martin, La controverse tritheite dans l'cmpirc byzantin au Vie
siecle, diss. Louvain I960; R.Y. Ebied, A. Van Roey, and L.R. Wickham, Peter of Cal-
linicum. Anti-Tritheist Dossier, OLA 10, Leuven 1981; A. Van Roey, La controverse
tritheite depuis la condamnation de Conon de Eugene jusqu'a la conversion de
l'eveque Elie, in: W.C. Delsman, J.T. Nelis, J.R.T.M. Peters, W.H.Ph. Romer and
A.S. van der Woude, Von Kanaan bis Kerala, Festschrift fur Prof. Mag. Dr. Dr.
J.P.M. van der Ploeg O.P. zur Vollendung des siebzigsten Lebensjahres am 4. Juli
1979. Uberreicht von Kollegen, Freunden und Schiiler, Alter Orient und Altes Tes
tament. Veroffentlichungen zur Kultur und Geschichte des Alten Orients und des Al
an Testaments, Bd. 211, Neukirchen and Vluyn 1982, 487-497; A. Van Roey, La
controverse tritheite jusqu'a l'excommunication de Conon et d'Eugene (557-569),
OLP 16, 1985, 141-165; A. Van Roey and P. Allen, Monophysite Texts of the Sixth
Century, OLA 56, Leuven 1994; Grillmeier, Jesus der Christus 2/3 (see note 1), 279-
291.
4 Norton, Episcopal Elections (see note 1). For a balanced critique of Norton's book see
R. Lim, on Bryn Mawr Classical Review website 2009.07.52, accessed 20 July 2009.
5 Some aspects of the chronologies of episcopal succession in what follows are only
approximate. See T. Hainthaler in Grillmeier, Jesus der Christus 2/3 (see note 1), for
a tentative table of patriarchs after 451 and an outline of the difficulties of dating. In
the prosopographical presentation that follows in this chapter anti-Chalcedonian pa
triarchs in Antioch are indicated by square brackets.

Episcopal Succession in Antioch in the Sixth Century 25
simply as a contrast to the violence and bloodshed that had previously
accompanied episcopal successions in Antioch in the fifth century.6
488/491-498 Palladius
This episcopal election is strictly speaking outside my chronological
framework, but I include it because in one source a future emperor is said
to have been one of the candidates.
Palladius was a Syrian priest, attached to the great martyrion of St
Thecla in Seleucia Pieria (port of Antioch). He accepted Zeno's Henoticon.
The future emperor Anastasius I, who also accepted the Henoticon, is said
by the eighth/ninth-century pro-Chalcedonian chronicler Theophanes also
to have been a candidate for the episcopacy.
Palladius seems to have died from natural causes. The main sources for
his succession are the anti-Chalcedonian church historian Zachariah Rhe
tor or Scholasticus, and Theophanes/
498-512 Flavian II
Like Palladius, Flavian was a Syrian priest; before his election he was also
apocrisiarius or representative of the see of Antioch in Constantinople -
presumably the representative of his precursor, Palladius. Flavian had been
a monk in the pro-Chalcedonian monastery of Tilmognon in Syria
Secunda. A moderate, he accepted the Henoticon, and was therefore at one
with emperor Anastasius' eirenic ecclesiastical policies, until the bishop
was unable to maintain order in his see. Then, unequal to challenges
posed by the anti-Chalcedonian bishop Philoxenus of Mabbug and Syrian
monks, he withdrew from Antioch, and emperor Anastasius exiled him to
Petra where he died.8
6 The most notorious of these were the four accessions of Peter the Fuller (469-470,
470-471, 475-476, and 484-491 [?]), and the murder of Patriarch Stephen in 479.
See further Downey, History of Antioch (see note 1), 486-502.
7 Zach. rh. (= Zach schol.) h.e. VI 6 (CSCO 84 Syr. 39, 11-15 Brooks); Theoph.
chron. AM 5983 (ed. C. de Boor, Theophanis Chronographia, vol. 1, Leipzig 1883,
135). Secondary sources: L. Duchesne, L'Eglise au VIeme siecle, Paris 1925, 8-9;
Downey, History of Antioch (see note 1), 507-508; W. Mayer and P. Allen, The
Churches of Syrian Antioch (300-638 CE), Late Antique History and Religion, Leu-
vzn20\0, onihzmartyrion.
8 Primary sources: Evagr. h.e. Ill 31-32 (ed. by J. Bidez/L. Parmentier, The Ecclesias
tical History of Evagrius with the Scholia, Byzantine Texts, London 1898, 127-131);

26 Pauline Allen
512-518 Severus
Despite what the sources try to tell us, Severus was born a pagan, not a
Christian, in Sozopolis (Pisidia). He subsequently studied rhetoric and law
in Alexandria and Berytus, before being converted to anti-Chalcedonian
Christianity in Palestine. He became a monk there and an agitator for the
anti-Chalcedonian cause, which he transferred to Constantinople in an
effort to lobby the emperor Anastasius, who made him his theological
adviser. Severus' election was engineered by bishop Philoxenus of Mabbug
and Syrian monks, and supported by emperor Anastasius. For Severus'
consecration as patriarch of Antioch we possess rare documentary evidence
in the form of his public profession of faith on that occasion and the sig
nature of the consecrating bishops.9 His first homily as patriarch could not
be heard for noise, from which we may assume that his election was not
without its critics. Hence Norton rightly observes: "Anastasius would only
hand over to Severus with strings attached, and when Severus asked for
military support to enforce Monophysite orthodoxy in parts of Oriens, he
was refused on the grounds that there would be too much bloodshed."10
On the accession of the pro-Chalcedonian emperor Justin I in 518,
Severus, like many anti-Chalcedonian bishops, was exiled, and fled to
Egypt, where for twenty years he continued to administer the anti-
Chalcedonian church in Syria (although technically as an exile he was a
non-citizen). Many of his letters come from his exile and demonstrate the
administrative care and skill which he exercised even at a distance until his
death twenty years later in 538.
It is a remarkable fact in the period which we are studying in this pa
per that we have six edited biographies of Severus, in only one of which he
Theoph. chron. AM 5991 (ed. De Boor, vol. 1, 142) (who says that Flavian opposed
Chalcedon). Secondary works: A. de Halleux, Philoxene de Mabbog. Sa vie, ses ecrits,
sa theologie, Louvain 1963, 64-75; Frend, Rise of the Monophysite Movement (see
note 1), 214-220.
9 See Severus of Antioch, ed. and trans. M.-A. Kugener, Allocution prononcee par
Severe apres son elevation sur le trone patriarchal dAntioche, OC 2, 1902, 265-282.
Secondary sources: J. Lebon, Le monophysisme severien, Louvain 1909 [repr. New
York 1978]; Honigmann (see note 1), Eveques et eveches, 19-25; Frend, Rise of the
Monophysite Movement (see note 1), 201-235; F. Alpi, Recherches sur
l'administration et la pastorale de Severe dAntioche (512-519), diss. Universite de
Lille III, 2003 (microfilm; forthcoming in print in two volumes); P. Allen and C.T.R.
Hayward, Severus of Antioch, The Early Church Fathers, London 2004; Norton, Epi
scopal Elections (see note 1), 94 n. 29, and 239.
10 Norton, Episcopal Elections (see note 1), 239.

Episcopal Succession in Antioch in the Sixth Century 27
is portrayed (compendiously) as the ideal bishop.11 The biography com
posed by his friend Zachariah Scholasticus deals deliberately with Severus'
(pagan) life before his episcopate. However, at the end of this work Seve
rus is said to have re-established union with the Egyptian church which his
predecessor Flavian had broken.12 In fact Severus spent most of his life in
Egypt, either as a student or an exile. The positive and negative aspects of
this Antiochene-Alexandrian nexus are to become increasingly critical in
the sixth century.
519-521 Paul"the Jew-
Paul was a native of Constantinople, where he was priest and chief admin
istrator of hostels for Christian tourists. He was acceptable to Rome and to
pro-Roman Scythian monks in Constantinople, and therefore acceptable
to emperor Justin's foreign policy of unification with Rome. Paul had
lived in Antioch for two years during Severus' episcopate and had clashed
with him.13 However, for some reason his election took place more than
three months after the exile of Severus, contrary to canon 25 of the Coun
cil of Chalcedon, which states that "the ordination of bishops should take
place within three months, unless the period of delay has been caused to
be extended by some unavoidable necessity".14 Collectio Avelkna contains
the information that there were plans to consecrate Paul in Constantin
ople, but the papal legates intervened and insisted that the ceremony take
place in Antioch, as Pope Hormisdas had instructed.15 Perhaps this ac
counts for the delayed consecration. Paul was probably elected also be
cause of his financial expertise, given the state of the depleted church cof
fers in Antioch at the time, as we know from the homilies and letters of
Severus.16 Emperor Justin I gave Paul a huge amount of money to kick-
start his episcopate.
11 For these sources see Allen and Hayward, Severus of Antioch (see note 9), 4-5. The
biography in which Severus is portrayed as the ideal bishop is the fifteenth-century
homily by a bishop of Assiut; see Y.N. Youssef in PO 50/1, Turnhout 2006.
12 Vie de Severe par Zacharie le Scholastique, ed. and trans. M.-A. Kugener, PO 2, Paris
1907, 3-115 at 114, 6-7.
13 See Collectio Avellana 17 (CSEL 35/1-2, 677,21-27 O. Guenther).
14 In N.P. Tanner, Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, vol. 1 (Nicaea I-Lateran V),
London and Washington, DC 1990, 98.
15 Collectio Avellana 216 (675 Guenther).
16 See further Allen and Hayward, Severus of Antioch (see note 9), 14-15.

28 Pauline Allen
The new patriarch encountered opposition in Antioch because of his
persecuting policy, hence his cognomen "the Jew", and appears to have
withdrawn, after which he died. Norton says rightly that Paul's mission
"was probably doomed at the outset but [his] conduct quickly alienated
the people and clergy".17
521-526 Euphrasius
Almost everything about Euphrasius is obscure. His origins could have
been Palestinian, Syrian, or Samarian, and his curriculum vitae before his
succession to the patriarchal throne of Antioch is unknown. If he was a
Palestinian by origin, he was most likely pro-Chalcedonian, which would
fit the imperial ecclesiastical policies of the time. What we do know about
him is that he was killed in the Antiochene earthquake of 526.18 Evagrius,
the eirenic Chalcedonian church historian, says almost nothing about
Euphrasius, indicating that his was a contentious appointment; the anti-
Chalcedonian church historian Zachariah Rhetor claims that the patriarch
was killed in a burning cauldron of wax during the earthquake, which
sounds like the punishment of a persecutor. The twelfth-century Jacobite
chronicler, Michael the Syrian, who often preserves earlier reliable sources,
condemns Euphrasius, saying that he "went to the gehenna reserved for
his master Satan. May his memory be cursed."19
17 Episcopal Elections, 202. Sources: Collectio Avellana 167, 216, 217, 223, 241, 242
(CSEL 35/2, 618-621, 675-679, 683-684, 740-742 Guenther); Malalas chron. 17,6
(CSHB Berlin 35, Berlin 2000, 338 Thurn); Ps.-Zach. rh. h.e. VIII 1 and VIII 6
(CSCO 84, 60-62 and 83 Brooks); Evagr. h.e. IV 4 (154-155 Bidez/Parmentier);
John of Nikiu chron. 90,14 (ed. and transl. H. Zotenberg, Chronique de Jean, eveque
de Nikiou, Paris 1883, 383). Secondary sources: A.A. Vasiliev, Justin the First. An In
troduction to the Epoch of Justinian the Great, Cambridge MA 1950, 206; Norton,
Episcopal Elections (see note 1), 94 and 202-203; V.L. Menze, Justinian and the
Making of the Syrian Orthodox Church, Oxford Early Christian Studies, Oxford
2008, 8-49, and 196-144 on monks and monasteries.
18 Sources: Ps.-Zach. rh. h.e. VIII 1,4-5 (61-62 Brooks); Malalas chron. 17,11; 22 (342
and 352 Thurn); Marc. Com. chron. a. 526 (PL 51, 941); John Eph. h.e. I 41
(CSCO 105 Syr. 54, 50-51 E.W. Brooks); Evagr. h.e. IV 4 (154-155 Bi
dez/Parmentier). Secondary sources: Honigmann, Eveques et eveches (see note 1),
148-149; Downey, History of Antioch (see note 1), 591, 521, 526.
19 Ed. and trans. J.-B. Chabot, Michael the Syrian, Chronique, vols 1-2, Paris 1899-
1901, vol. 2, 179.

Episcopal Succession in Antioch in the Sixth Century 29
526-545 Ephrem
One of the most impressive Antiochene patriarchs of the sixth century,
Ephrem was a native of Amida (Mesopotamia I) and thus a native Syriac-
speaker. He was bilingual.
As comes Orientis he was responsible for repairing the damage caused
by the major earthquake of 526; subsequently his superlative administra
tive skills were recognised, possibly by public acclaim, and he was ap
pointed patriarch. Perhaps for the purposes of emperor Justin I and his co-
regent/nephew Justinian, Ephrem was a suitable candidate because he
could control anti-Chalcedonian feeling in his home territory of east Syria.
But in any case his succession might have been seen as contentious, be
cause in Justinianic legislation passed the year after Ephrem's death any
one coming from the imperial or military service was categorically banned
from becoming a bishop unless they had spent the last fifteen years in a
monastery.20 Although, like Euphrasius, he is denounced in the anti-
Chalcedonian sources as a persecutor, Ephrem was a very able theologian.
Conceivably he suffered from stress and overwork in his reasonably long
patriarchate, given the disasters which occurred on his watch - plague, a
Persian invasion, and an earthquake, to name the most serious. We can
compare the case of Julian, patriarch of Antioch, who was said to have
died in 471 "from vexation".21 Perhaps more than any other bishop under
consideration in this paper, Ephrem bears out half of Norton's contention:
"It is perhaps not an oversimplification to suggest that to many there
seemed to be only two ideal types of bishop - either someone who could
help to get things done here on earth, or someone whose sheer holiness
20 See e.g. Norton, Episcopal Elections (see note 1), 46-47, and 35 n. 34, on Justinian's
legislation: "Anyone coming from the local curia or imperial service was categorically
banned [from becoming a bishop], unless they had spent the last 15 years in a monas
tery and they had also settled their fiscal obligations to the state." (Novel 123.1-4 [AD
546] [CIC(B).N 594-599 Schoell/Kroll]; cf. Novel 137 [AD 565] [696-697
Schoell/Kroll].
21 Sources: Ps.-Zach. rh. h.e. VIII 4; X 1 (74-77 and 174-176 Brooks); Vita Symeonis
25; 71 (ActaSS Maii vol. V, 316; 334 C. Janning); Evagr. h.e. IV 6 (156 Bi-
dez/Parmentier); John Moschus, Pratum Spirituale 36 (PG 87/3, 2883-2886); Eph
rem's own theological works. Secondary works: J. Lebon, Ephrem d'Amid, patriarche
d'Antioche (526-544), in: Melanges d'Histoire offerts a Charles Moeller, vol. 1, Lou-
vain 1914, 197-214; Honigmann, Eveques et eveches (see note 1), 49, 232; G.
Downey, Ephraemius, patriarch of Antioch, Church History 7, 1938, 365-370;
Grillmeier, Jesus der Christus 2/3, 357-373; Menze, Justinian and the Making of the
Syrian Orthodox Church (see note 17), 119-120, 196-198. On Julian's death "from
vexation" (ko Xv^s) see Downey, History of Antioch (see note 1), 488 with n. 59.

30 Pauline Allen
could help intercede with God."22 Ephrem definitely belonged to the first
category.
545-559 Domninus/Domnus
Domninus, sometimes called Domnus in the sources, was of Thracian
origin. We are told that originally he was the director of a poor-house in
Lychnidos (Achrida, modern Ochrid) in Epirus nova, thus quite some
distance west from Antioch. The circumstances of his election as they are
recounted are extremely odd: supposedly he happened to be in Constan
tinople on business for his poor-house when candidates for the vacancy in
Antioch were being considered in the capital. Domninus found favour
with emperor Justinian, very likely because he was Chalcedonian, and
became patriarch of Antioch. Possibly because of his Thracian origin, the
new patriarch was unpopular with the Antiochenes. This is reflected in the
negative story about him recounted by the contemporary hagiographer of
Symeon Stylites the Younger (third quarter of the sixth century) and the
silence in the church historian Evagrius (who tries to be conciliatory in
ecclesiastical matters). The biographer of Symeon relates that when
Domninus (the former director of a poor-house, we remember) arrived in
Antioch, he was disgusted at the number of poor people congregated at
the city gates and decided to have them removed. Shortly afterwards, as a
punishment from God, he became unable to walk and eventually died.23
[558 (?)-560 Sergius (anti-Chalcedonian)]24
Sergius was the first of the shadow anti-Chalcedonian patriarchs of An
tioch. His origins lay in Telia (Constantina, east of Edessa), in the prov
ince of Osrhoene. He was a priest, and friend and supporter of the foun
dational anti-Chalcedonian missionary bishop, Jacob Baradaeus, after
whom in some quarters the followers of Severus of Antioch took their
name "Jacobites". Most importantly for our investigation Sergius was a
22 Norton, Episcopal Elections (see note 1), 49.
23 Sources: Vita Symeonis 72. 202. 204 (334, 383, 384 janning); Evagr. h.e. IV 37 (186
Bidez/Parmentier); Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot vol. 2, 267), (hostile). Secondary
sources: P. Van den Ven, La vie ancienne de S. Symeon Stylite le jeune (521-592),
Subsidia Hagiographica 32, Brussels, 1970, vol. 2, 79; Grillmeier, Jesus der Christus
2/3, 307.
24 From now on I indicate the shadow anti-Chalcedonian patriarchs by square brackets.

Episcopal Succession in Antioch in the Sixth Century 31
tritheist; this is where tritheism first manifests itself as a factor in episcopal
succession in sixth-century Antioch.
The circumstances of Sergius' election and his patriarchate are un
usual, to say the least: he was consecrated bishop in Constantinople as
"successor" to Severus (d. 538) and never left there. This was probably an
anti-Chalcedonian election of only symbolic value for Antioch, as later
historians call Sergius "patriarch of Constantinople". His consecration
demonstrates the strategic importance of Antioch to the anti-
Chalcedonians, and may have precipitated the election of Anastasius I,
who was well acquainted with tritheism and had written against it.25 As far
as we know, Sergius died a natural death.26
559-570 Anastasius I
Of Palestinian origin, Anastasius was apocrisiarius of the see of Antioch
(thus the representative of patriarch Domninus/Domnus) in Alexandria.
He was a strong figure, a very able neo-Chalcedonian theologian, and
composed works against tritheism, as I have said. In fact, his election was
very likely due to his anti-tritheist stance. According to Evagrius (h.e. 5.5),
the future emperor Justin II asked Anastasius to hand over money to him
on his election as patriarch, but the church historian is hostile to Justin.
Anastasius' demise occurred when he refused to subscribe emperor Justin
ian's aphthartodocetist edict, then after Justinian's death he fell foul of the
erratic Justin II for failing to effect ecclesiastical unity with anti-
Chalcedonians, through no fault of his own. Anastasius was taken to Con
stantinople and kept there probably under arrest. It is likely that he also
objected to interference in Egyptian affairs by his former apocrisiarius, the
anti-tritheist patriarch of Constantinople, John Scholasticus, who conse
crated a candidate from the capital as patriarch of Alexandria. According
to the twelfth-century chronicler, Michael the Syrian,27 Anastasius was
chased out by the Chalcedonians, meaning the emperor and the patriarch
25 See CPG 6958; ed. K.-H. Uthemann, Des Patriarchen Anastasius I. von Antiochien
Jerusalemer Streitgesprach mit einem Tritheiten (CPG 6958), Traditio 37, 1981, 73-
108.
26 Sources: John Eph. Lives 49. 50 ( P019/2, 153-158). Secondary works: E.W. Brooks,
The Patriarch Paul of Antioch and the Alexandrine Schism of 575, ByZ 30, 1930,
468-476; Honigmann, Eveques et eveches (see note 1), 192-195.
27 Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot, vol. 2, 292).

32 Pauline Allen
of Constantinople.28 Here we have a case of an Antiochene bishop deposed
for supporting the autonomy of the see of Alexandria against Constanti-
nopolitan interference.
[564-581 Paul"the Black"]
A native of Alexandria, Paul was a monk and probably spent some time in
Syria. He became the syncellus or associate of the anti-Chalcedonian and
anti-tritheist leader Theodosius of Alexandria in Constantinople. At some
stage in his career he was an archimandrite.
Paul was more or less unwittingly and forcibly consecrated through
the influence of ex-patriarch Theodosius of Alexandria, three years after
the death of Sergius (560), although the charismatic Jacob Baradaeus was
still alive and was technically in charge of Syria. In other words, this was
an irregular consecration. Theodosius' aim was to have Paul consecrate
bishops and clergy in Egypt. According to Michael the Syrian,29 it was the
monks of Antioch who wanted Paul as bishop. From the start of Paul's
episcopate there was therefore considerable stress on the relations between
the anti-Chalcedonian churches of Syria and Egypt.
In any case Paul was a puppet who spent more time out of his patriar
chate than in it, although this was typical of the shadow hierarchy in Sy
ria.30 In reality he had aspirations to be patriarch of his home city of Alex
andria. On two occasions Paul communicated with Chalcedonians,
recanted, and was imprisoned. Subsequently he was responsible for insti
gating a serious schism between Antioch and Alexandria. Paul sought re
fuge more than once in the desert with the anti-Chalcedonian Arab leader,
28 Sources Chron. Pasch. Olym. 343 (CSHB 10, 692 L. Dindorf); Vita Symeonis 204
(384 Janning); Vita Eutychii (CChr.SG 25 Carl Laga); Evagr. h.e. IV 39-41 (190-192
Bidez/Parmentier), V 5 (201 Bidez/Parmentier), VI 24 (240-241 Bidez/Parmentier);
Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot vol. 2, 172-173 and 292); Anastasius' theological
works (CPG 6944-6963). Secondary works: Duchesne, L'Eglise au VIeme siecle, 272-
274; G. Weiss, Studia Anastasiana I. Studien zum Leben, zu den Schriften und zur
Theologie des Patriarchen Anastasius I. von Antiochien (559-598), Miscellanea Mo-
nacensia 4, Munich 1965; P. Goubert, Patriarches d'Antioche et dAlexandrie con-
temporains de saint Gregoire le Grand, REByz 25, 1967, 65-76 at 65-68; S.N. Sak-
kos, Anastasii Antiocheni opera omnia genuine quae supersunt, Thessaloniki 1976;
Allen, Evagrius (see note 1), 24, 204-205, 214-217; Mi. Whitby, Evagrius on Pa
triarchs and Emperors, in Ma. Whitby (ed.), The Propaganda of Power. The Role of
Panegyric in Late Antiquity, Leiden 1998, 321-343 at 331-332; Grillmeier, Jesus der
Chrisms 2/3, 374-402.
29 Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot vol. 2, 319).
30 See Honigmann, Eveques et eveches (see note 1), 173.

Episcopal Succession in Antioch in the Sixth Century 33
al-Moundhir. During his patriarchate there was an interesting case of an
aborted consecration of a replacement anti-Chalcedonian patriarch, Seve-
rus,31 a candidate of Patriarch Damian of Alexandria. Significantly it was
the Chalcedonian patriarch Gregory (570-593) who prevented the ordina
tion, presumably to prevent further splintering among the anti-
Chalcedonians. Paul died either in Isauria or Constantinople.32 His impor
tance in the history of the anti-Chalcedonians in the second half of the
sixth century is reflected in a remarkable dossier of forty-five documents
compiled by an anonymous supporter of Paul's position, in which the
tritheist controversy plays a significant part,33
570-593 Gregory
Gregory was perhaps of Palestinian origin. He had been a monk at Pharan
and on Sinai, and at the time of his elevation to the patriarchate of An
tioch he was abbot34 of the monastery of the Byzantines in Jerusalem. A
man of action, having repelled Arab incursions on Sinai, Gregory was
appointed by emperor Justin II, who had also appointed him to Sinai. The
new patriarch seems to have been generally acceptable to both Chalcedo-
nians and anti-Chalcedonians,35 He died as a result of taking a drug for
gout,36
31 John Eph. h.e. IV 41(221-224 Brooks); Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot vol. 2, 345).
32 Sources: Documenta monophysitica (ed. by J.-B. Chabot, Documenta ad origines
monophysitarum illustrandas, CSCO 17 and 103, Paris 1907 and 1933); John Eph.
h.e. IV 41(221-224 Brooks); Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot vol. 2, 345). Nota bene:
there is nothing about Paul in the Chalcedonian documents. Secondary works:
Brooks, The Patriarch Paul of Antioch (see note 26), 468-476; Honigmann, Eveques
et eveches (see note 1), 195-205; Van Roey and Allen, Monophysite Texts (see note
3), 265-303.
33 The dossier is edited and translated by J.-B. Chabot, Documenta ad origines mono
physitarum illustrandas, CSCO 17 and 103, Louvain 1908 and 1933, and studied in
detail by Van Roey and Allen, Monophysite Texts (see note 3), 265-303.
34 Apocrisiarius, according to Theoph. chron. AM 6062 (ed. De Boor, vol. 1, 243).
35 Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot vol. 2, 292).
36 Sources: Evagr. h.e. V 6 (201-203 Bidez/Parmentier) and VI 24 (240-241
Bidez/Parmentier); John Moschus, Pratum spirituale 140 (PC 87/3, 3003-3004);
Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot vol. 2, 292 and 344). Secondary works: S. Vailhe,
Repertoire alphabetique des monasteres de Palestine, ROC 4, 1899, 512-542; P.
Goubert, Patriarches d'Antioche et d'Alexandrie contemporains de saint Gregoire le
Grand, REByz 25, 1967, 65-76 at 68-71; Allen, Evagrius (see note 1), 217-218;
Whitby, Evagrius on patriarchs and emperors (see note 28), 329-331.

34 Pauline Allen
[581-591 Peter of Callinicum (anti-Chalcedonian)]
As his name indicates, Peter was a native of Callinicum in Euphrasia. He
was bilingual in Syriac and Greek,37 a monk, and anti-tritheist. As a young
man Peter was consecrated by Damian, anti-Chalcedonian patriarch of
Alexandria, either in the monastery of Goubba Barraya (close to Cyrrhus),
or Mar Hanania,38 during the lifetime of Paul the Black - again an irregu
lar succession. Once more we observe interference in the Antiochene
church by the patriarch of Alexandria. Originally friends, Peter and
Damian became bitter enemies over the question of how to handle the
tritheists,39 Peter appears to have died a natural death.40
[591-595 Julian (anti-Chalcedonian)]
We know little about Julian. He was a monk of a monastery in Qennesrin
(Chalcis) and had been the syncellus (patriarch's associate) of Peter of
Callinicum. Perhaps he was therefore also anti-tritheist, like Peter. The
circumstances of Julian's election are unknown, as are those of his death.41
593-599 Anastasius I (for the second time)
I have dealt with the origins and curriculum vitae of Anastasius in connec
tion with his first patriarchate. After his deposition by Justin II and patri-
arch John Scholasticus of Constantinople, Anastasius apparently lived in
the capital from 570 until 593, where he befriended Gregory, future
37 Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot vol. 2, 348).
38 On the location of this monastery near Callinicum see Ebied, Van Roey, and Wick-
ham, Anti-Tritheist Dossier (see note 3), 4-5.
39 See further R.Y. Ebied, Peter of Antioch and Damian of Alexandria: the end of a
friendship, in: R.H. Fischer (ed.), A Tribute to Arthur Voobus. Studies in Early
Christian Literature and Its Environment, Primarily in the Syrian East, Chicago 1977,
277-282.
40 Sources: his writings (CPG 7250-7255); Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot vol. 2, 345-
348). Secondary works: Allen, Evagrius (see note 1), 32-36; Ebied, Van Roey, and
Wickham, Anti-Tritheist Dossier (see note 3); Van Roey, La controverse (see note 3);
Van Roey and Allen, Monophysite Texts (see note 3).
41 Sources: Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot vol. 2, 234, 373, 375). Secondary works: J.
Maspero, Histoire des patriarches dAlexandrie (518-616), rev. by A. Fortescue and G.
Writ, BEHE fasc. 237, Paris 1923, 319; Honigmann, Eveques et eveches (see note 1),
243.

Episcopal Succession in Antioch in the Sixth Century 35
bishop of Rome, who was nuntius there. As an old man he was appointed
to the patriarchate of Antioch for a second time by emperor Maurice, very
likely as a peace-broker with anti-Chalcedonians. The speech he made on
his return to Antioch has peace as its predominant theme. Additionally,
Anastasius' second appointment no doubt came about because of his fa
miliarity with tritheism and the Alexandrian church, relations with which
were becoming ever more critical. However, the influence of Anastasius'
friend, Pope Gregory I, was also instrumental in his restoration, as we are
informed by some of the Pope's letters.42 Anastasius appears to have died a
natural death at an old age.43
[595-634 Athanasius Gamal or Camel-driver (anti-Chalcedonian)]
The successor to Julian, Athanasius was a Syrian (born in Samosata), and
before his consecration, like Julian, was also a monk in a monastery in
Qennesrin (Chalcis). This fact may associate him with the anti-tritheist
movement. Athanasius was reportedly driving a camel when the Syrian
bishops, acting on a dream which told them to ordain the first monk they
saw when the monastery gates opened in the morning, forced him to be
consecrated patriarch of Antioch. On his demand, his consecration re
mained secret for a year, during which he was permitted to remain a
camel-driver. It must be said that this story is the stuff of legend and may
have been devised to excuse the camel-driver's humble background. What
ever of that, in his long patriarchate Athanasius devoted a great deal of
energy to establishing peace - unsuccessfully - with the anti-Chalcedonian
church of Alexandria. He seems to have died a natural death.44
42 See further Weiss, Studia Anastasiana (see note 28), 34-44.
43 Sources: see above under Anastasius' first patriarchate; Oratio pacificatoria, ed. LB.
Pitra, in Iuris Ecclesiastici Graecorum Historia et Monumenta, Rome 1868, vol. 2,
251-257; Greg. Mag. Registrum 1,6. 7. 24. 25 (CChr.SL 140, 7-8; 9-10; 22-32; 33-
34 Norberg); 5,41. 42 (320-327 Norberg); 8,2 (CChr.SL 140A, 514-517 Norberg);
9,136 (CChr.SL 140A, 685-687 Norberg). Secondary works: see above, esp. Weiss,
Studia Anastasiana (see note 28).
44 Sources: Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot vol. 2, 375-377), (hagiographical). Secondary
works: Maspero, Histoire des patriarches d'Alexandrie (see note 41), 319-323; R. De-
vreesse, Le patriarcat d'Antioche depuis la paix de l'eglise jusqu'a la conquete arabe,
Paris 1945, 102; Downey, History of Antioch (see note 1), 576-577; D. Olster, Chal-
cedonian and monophysite: the union of 616, Bulletin de la Societe d'archeologie
copte 27, 1985, 93-108; P. Allen, Sophronius of Jerusalem and Seventh-Century He
resy. The Synodical Letter and Other Documents, OECT, Oxford 2009, 24, 26, 43,
59-61, 145.

36 Pauline Allen
Some Conclusions
What can we conclude from these fifteen case-studies? Let us first consider
whether the provenance of candidates played a role in sixth-century Antio-
chene episcopal elections. Ephrem, apart from being a native Syrian, was
also the right man in the right place at the right time. In the case of Dom-
ninus, his western, Chalcedonian background apparently played a role.
Anti-Chalcedonians tended to be Syrian, with the notable exceptions of
Severus (Pisidia) and Paul the Black (Alexandria). Paul's Alexandrian pe
digree was in fact a source of discontent among Antiochenes. Here again
we note the tension between the churches of Syria and Egypt.
In the post-Chalcedonian context of Antioch we need to consider not
only the circumstances of episcopal succession but also those in which
predecessors died or left their bishoprics. The case of the expulsion of
Severus as a result of a change in imperial policy and the appointment of
Paul "the Jew" to maintain the Chalcedonian position is a good example.
For sixth-century Antioch we are at the mercy of our sources, probably
more than usual, because of the polarization of the writers. Again, with the
notable exception of Severus, we have no full biographies of Antiochene
patriarchs (as I mentioned, for Severus we have no fewer than six), and,
given the polarization in the sources, it is consequently difficult to arrive at
a definition of the "ideal" bishop in sixth-century Antioch. Possible rea
sons for the imbalance in hagiographical sources would be worth further
consideration. I shall return to the topic of the "ideal" bishop below.
In the introduction I suggested that tritheism lay behind some epi
scopal successions. This seems certain in the case of the anti-Chalcedonian
tritheist Sergius, and at least very probable in that of the anti-tritheists
Anastasius I, a Chalcedonian, and Peter of Callinicum, an anti-Chalce
donian. It would also seem logical to posit tritheism as a factor in the suc
cession of the anti-Chalcedonian Julian, syncellus of Peter of Callinicum.
We can only speculate whether, because of his association with a monas
tery in Qennesrin, where Julian had been a monk, Athanasius the Camel-
driver was also anti-tritheist.
How did the sixth-century Antiochene bishops come to power? Ca
nonical criteria seem to have been completely sidestepped in the case of
Ephrem.« Paul, Domninus, Anastasius I (first appointment), and Gregory
were imperial appointments. Anastasius' second appointment (as an old
man, c. 75) was certainly influenced by Gregory of Rome and possibly by
Emperor Maurice. Monks were instrumental in the election of Severus,
45 See Norton, Episcopal Elections (see note 1), 46-47, for the criteria.

Episcopal Succession in Antioch in the Sixth Century 37
but so too were Syrian bishops, notably Philoxenus of Mabbug. The Anti-
ochene people, together with the emperor, played an important role in
having Ephrem translated quickly from comes Orientis to patriarch but it is
unclear from the sources to what extent they influenced other episcopal
successions. Some elections were not successions in the strict sense, or else
they were quite irregular. This is especially true of the anti-Chalcedonians.
For example, Sergius was consecrated as the so-called "successor" of Seve-
rus of Antioch in about 558, some twenty years after Severus' death. Paul
the Black, we are told, was unwittingly consecrated. In the case of the
succession of Peter of Callinicum, the previous anti-Chalcedonian pa
triarch was still living.
The role of the late-antique bishop has been exaggerated in some
modern scholarship as "lover of the poor", "champion of the poor", etc.46
Sixth-century Antiochene evidence suggests that, at least on the Chalce-
donian side, peaceful, diplomatic negotiation was the criterion for elec
tion, often with imperial intervention to back it up. The conciliatory
christological movement of neo-Chalcedonianism embraced by Anastasius
I and Gregory was to lead to further attempts at ecclesiastical unity in
monoenergism and monotheletism in the seventh century.47 Anastasius
would have been acceptable as patriarch to both supporters and opponents
of the Council of Chalcedonian if Justin II's religious policies had been
articulated in a more coherent fashion.48 In Anastasius' speech on his re
turn to his patriarchate in 593 the dominant theme is peace. It is telling
too that the Chalcedonian Gregory is said in the anti-Chalcedonian tradi
tion to have been a caring pastor, to have acted charitably even towards
opponents of the Council of Chalcedon, and to have made it his business
to make peace with everybody.49 On the anti-Chalcedonian side Athana-
sius the Camel-driver was to play an important, if eventually unsuccessful,
role in re-establishing peace between the anti-Chalcedonian churches of
Antioch and Alexandria in 616, much to the subsequent derision of Soph-
46 Especially P. Brown, Poverty and Leadership in the Later Roman Empire, The Mena-
hem Stern Jerusalem Lectures, London 2002. See the challenge to Brown in P. Allen,
B. Neil, and W. Mayer, Preaching Poverty in Late Antiquity. Perceptions and
Realities, Arbeiten zur Kirchen- und Theologiegeschichte 28, Leipzig 2009.
47 See in detail K.-H. Uthemann, Der Neuchalkedonismus als Vorbereitung des
Monotheletismus. Ein Beitrag zum eigentlichen Anliegen des Neuchalkedonismus,
StPatr29,Leuven 1997, 373-413.
48 See further Allen, Evagrius (see note 1), 28-30.
49 Mich. Syr. chron. (ed. Chabot vol. 2, 292).

38 Pauline Allen
ronius, Chalcedonian patriarch of Jerusalem in the 530s, and the pro-
Chalcedonian chronicler Theophanes.50
The pattern of episcopal succession at Antioch, especially in the
second half of the sixth century, foreshadowed seventh-century attempts at
unity between pro- and anti-Chalcedonians on the one hand, and between
anti-Chalcedonians in Syria and Egypt on the other. Unfortunately none
of these attempts at unity was ultimately successful.51
50 For Sophronius see Allen, Sophronius of Jerusalem (see note 44), 24-25; Theoph.
chron. AM 6121 (ed. De Boor, vol. 1, 330, 10) (or his source) has the word
u6poPa<fi or "wishy-washy".
51 On this failure see further Olster, Chalcedonian and monophysite (see note 44), 93-
108; Allen, Sophronius of Jerusalem, 23-26.

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Whilst man has learnt to avoid swallowing poisonous plants,
although occasionally blundering over pretty-looking berries and
deceptive mushrooms, he has had little to fear in that way from
animals. To a small degree this is due to the fact that only parts of
animals are eaten by man, and those very generally are cooked
before being eaten, the heating often sufficing to destroy substances
present in flesh, fish, and fowl which would be poisonous if taken
raw. But, as a matter of fact, animals do not generally protect
themselves from being eaten, as plants largely do, by developing
nasty or poisonous substances in their flesh, though some do. They
fight rather by claws, teeth, and poison glands therewith connected,
or else escape by extra quick locomotion, a method not possible to
plants. Many insects (butterflies, beetles, and bugs), however,
produce nasty aromatic substances which cause animals like birds
and lizards to reject them as food. The toad and the salamander
both produce a very deadly poison in their damp, soft skins, which
causes any animal to drop them from its mouth, and to regret
“bitterly” the attempt to swallow them. The frog has no such poison
in its skin, but can jump out of harm’s way. The strong yellow and
black marking of the European salamander is what is called a
“warning” coloration, just as is the yellow and black outfit of the
poisonous wasp. Animals learn to leave the yellow and black livery
untouched, and the creatures so marked escape the injury which
would be caused them by tentative bites.
There is a curious variation as to susceptibility on the part of man to
poison in the flesh of fishes and shell-fishes when taken by him as
food. The word “idiosyncrasy” is applied to such individual
susceptibility, and is, of course, applicable to the susceptibility shown
by some persons to the poison of the American poison-vine,
described in the last article, and of others to acute inflammation
from the dust of hayfields. Some persons cannot eat lobster, crab, or
oysters or mussels without being poisoned in a varying degree by
certain substances present in those “shell-fish” even when cooked.
Often a “rash” is caused on the skin, and colic. Others, again, cannot
eat any fish of any kind without being poisoned in a similar way, or

possibly are only liable to be poisoned by grey mullet or by
mackerel. The most curious cases of this individual variability are
found in the rash and fever caused by the vegetable drug quinine in
rare instances, and the violent excitement produced in some persons
by the usually soporific laudanum. All such cases have very great
interest as showing us what a small difference separates an
agreeable flavour or a valuable medicine from a rank poison, and
how readily the chemical susceptibility of a complex organism like
man may vary between toleration and deathly response, without any
concomitant indication of such difference being apparent (in our
present state of knowledge), in two individuals, to one of whom that
is poison which to the other is meat. They also furnish a parallel to
that marvellous conversion of “toxin” into “anti-toxin,” in
consequence of which the blood of an animal injected with small,
increasing doses of deadly snake poison or diphtheria poison
becomes an antidote to the same poison taken into the blood of an
unprepared animal.
There is, over and above these special cases of fish foods which are
tolerated by some and are poison to others, a whole series of fishes
which cannot be eaten by any one without serious poisoning being
the result, even when the fish are carefully cooked. Happily, these
fishes are rarely, if ever, caught on our own coasts. They produce,
when even small bits are eaten, violent irritation of the intestine, and
death, the symptoms resembling in many respects those of cholera.
The curious bright-coloured, beaked fish of tropical seas and coral
reefs, with two or four large front teeth and spherical spine-covered
bodies, and the trigger fish of the same regions, are the chief of
these poisonous fish. But there is a true anchovy on the coast of
Japan, and a small herring in the West Indies, and a goby on the
Indian coast (Pondicherry), all of which are deadly poison even when
cooked; and there are many others. So one has to be careful about
fish-eating in the remoter parts of the world. The poisons of these
fish with poisonous flesh have not been carefully studied, but they
seem to resemble chemically the poisons produced by certain
putrefactive microbes.

Let us now revert to the more special subject of poisonous stings.
Every one knows that although it is unpleasant to be pricked by the
little spines on the leaf of a thistle, it is not the same unpleasantness
as being “stung” by a nettle. There is no poison in the thistle. The
hairs which beset the leaves of the common nettle are firm, but
brittle and hollow; they break off in the skin, and a poison exudes
from their interior. Under the microscope—and it is quite easy to
examine it with a high power—the hollow nettle hair is seen to be
partly occupied by living protoplasm—a transparent, viscid substance
which shows an active streaming movement, and has embedded in it
a dense kernel or nucleus (see Fig. 15 bis). It is, in fact, a living
“cell,” or life unit. The space in the cell not occupied by protoplasm is
filled with clear liquid, which contains the poison. This has been
examined chemically by using a large quantity of nettle hairs, and is
found to contain formic acid—the same irritating acid which is
secreted by ants when they sting, whence its name. But later
observations show that the juice of the nettle hair contains also a
special poison in minute quantities, an albuminous substance, which
resembles that contained in the poison-sacs at the base of the teeth
of snakes.
In tropical regions there are nettles far more powerful than that of
our own country. The one called Urtica stimulans, which is found in
Java, and that called Laportea crenulata, found in Hindostan, when
bruised emit an effluvium which poisonously affects the eyes and
mouth, and if handled produce convulsions and serious swelling and
pain in the arms, which may last for three or four weeks, and in
some cases cause death. They are not unknown in the hothouses of
our botanical gardens, and young gardeners are sometimes badly
stung by them. There are other plants provided with poisonous
stinging hairs besides the true nettles or Urticaceæ, though they are
not numerous. The American plants called Loasa sting badly, so do
some of the Spurges (Euphorbiaceæ), and some Hydrophylleæ.
The Chinese primrose (Primula obconica), lately introduced into
greenhouses, has been found to be almost as injurious as the
poison-vine. Its effects, of course, are limited to a much smaller

group of sufferers. And it is worth while, in connection with
poisoning by primula and the poisoning by Rhus toxicodendron of
only certain individuals predisposed to its influence, to point out that
the malady known as hay fever seems to be similar in its character
to these vegetable poisonings. It is, of course, well known that only
certain individuals are liable to the more violent and serious form of
hay fever. It is not at all improbable that this irritation of the air
passages, often attributed to the mechanical action of the pollen of
grass and other plants—really is due to minute quantities of a poison
like that of the poison-vine, present in the pollen of some hay plant
yet to be suspected, tried, and convicted.
[2]
With regard to a poisonous action at a distance being possibly
exerted by plants, we must not overlook the effects of some
perfumes discharged into the air by flowers. Primarily such perfumes
appear to serve the flowers by attracting to them special insects, by
whose movements and search for honey in the flowers the pollen of
one is conveyed to another and fertilisation effected. Human beings
are sometimes injuriously affected by the heavy perfume given out
by lilies and other flowers, headache and even fainting being the
result. No instance is known of serious injury or death resulting in
the regions where they grow from the overpowering perfume of
such flowers. But that admirable story-teller, Mr. H. G. Wells, has
made a legitimate use of scientific possibilities in imagining the
existence of a rare tropical orchid which attracts large animals to it
by its wonderful odour. The effects of the perfume are narcotising;
the animal, having sniffed at the orchid, drops insensible at the foot
of the tree trunk on which the orchid grows. Then the orchid rapidly,
with animal-like celerity, sends forth those smooth green fingers or
“suckers,” which you may see clinging to the pots and shelves on
which an orchid is growing. As they slowly creep, in their growth,
over the poisoned animal, they absorb its life’s blood painlessly and
without disturbing the death-slumber of the victim. Mr. Wells
supposes a retired civil-servant, with feeble health and a passion for
orchids, to have purchased an unknown specimen, which, after
some months of nursing, is about to blossom in the little hothouse of

his suburban home. He goes quietly and alone one afternoon, when
his housekeeper is preparing his tea, to enjoy the first sight and
smell of the unknown flower, and is found, some three hours later,
lying insensible before the orchid, which is giving out an intoxicating
odour, and is looking very vigorous and wicked. A blood-red tint
pervades its leaves and stalks, and it has already pushed some of its
finger-like shoots round the orchid-lover’s neck and beneath his shirt
front. When they are pulled away a few drops of blood flow from the
skin where the absorbent shoots had applied themselves. The victim
recovers.
When we take a survey of the “stings” and poison-fangs and spurs
of animals, we find a much greater abundance and variety of these
weapons than in plants. They serve animals not only as a means of
defence, but very often for the purpose of attacking and paralysing
their prey. We have to distinguish broadly between (a) gut-poisons
and (b) wound-poisons. The slimy surface of the skin and the juices
of animals are often poisonous if introduced into wounds, but
harmless if swallowed, though in the toad and salamander the skin
contains a poison which acts on the mouth and stomach. Thus the
blood of the eel is poisonous to higher animals if injected beneath
the skin, though not poisonous when swallowed. Pasteur found that
the saliva of a healthy human baby a few weeks old produced
convulsions when injected beneath the skin of a rabbit. The fluid of
the mouth in fishes (Muræna), in some lizards (Heloderma), and
some warm-blooded quadrupeds, like the skunk, is often poisonous,
and is introduced into the wound inflicted by a bite. The elaboration
of a sac of the mouth-surface secreting a special quantity of poison
to be injected by aid of a grooved tooth, such as we find in
poisonous snakes, is only a mechanical improvement of this more
general condition. The same general poisonous quality is found in
the slime of the skins of fishes which have spines by means of which
poisonous wounds are inflicted (sting-rays). And here, too, an
elaboration is effected in some fishes in which a sac is provided for
the accumulation of the poison, and a specially grooved spine, to
convey the poison into the wound inflicted by it. A common fish on

our coasts, the weever (probably the same word as viper), is
provided with grooved, stinging spines, but no special poison-sac.
Some of the poison-carrying spines support the front portion of the
dorsal fin, which is of a deep black colour, a striking instance of the
warning coloration which poisonous animals often possess.
The poison introduced into wounds by the spines or fangs of animals
is essentially similar to that of nettle hairs; it has the effect of
paralysing and of producing convulsions. It is a remarkable fact that
formic acid often in insects accompanies the paralysing poison—as it
does in the nettle—and produces intense pain and irritation, which
the more dangerous nerve-poison does not. Immunity to a given
wound-poison may be produced by the injection of doses of it, at
first excessively minute, but gradually increased in quantity. A
remedial “anti-toxin” is thus prepared from the blood of immunised
animals, which is used as a cure or as a protection by injecting it
into other animals exposed to bites or wounds conveying the
particular poison by the use of which the anti-toxin was produced.
Bee-keepers who have often been stung become in many cases
immune, and do not suffer from bee-sting. Men who in France
pursue a business as viper-catchers, are said to become immune to
viper’s poison in the same way. Snakes and scorpions are but little, if
at all, affected by their own poison when it is injected into them.
This appears to be due to the fact that the poison-producing animal
is always absorbing into its blood very minute doses of the poison
which it has elaborated and stored up in its poison-sac connected
with the poison-gland. This small quantity of poison continually
absorbed is continually converted into an anti-toxin—just as happens
when a horse is treated with doses of snake-poison to prepare the
remedial anti-toxin for use in cases of snake-bite, or with diphtheria-
poison in order to prepare the diphtheria anti-toxin now so largely
used. The anti-toxin is a substance very closely similar in chemical
constitution to the toxin by the conversion of which it is formed in
the blood. Its action on the toxin (or essential poisonous substance
of the venom) appears to be a very delicate and slight chemical
disturbance of the constitution of that chemical body. Yet it is

enough to cause the injurious quality of the toxin to be suddenly and
completely abrogated, although from the point of view of chemical
composition it is only, as it were, shaken or given a twist! Such great
practical differences in the action on living creatures of chemical
bodies having themselves so subtle a difference of chemical
structure as to almost defy our powers of detection, are now well
known.
Fig. 15.—Drawing from life of the desert scorpion (Buthus
australis, Lin.), from Biskra, N. Africa, of the natural size.
(From Lankester, Journ. Linn. Soc. Zool., vol. xvi. 1881.)
[Transcriber’s Note: The original image is approximately 2 inches (5cm) high
and 3 inches (7.5cm) wide.]
I made some experiments a few years ago on the poison of
scorpions, which were published by the Linnæan Society. I obtained
live scorpions—a beautiful citron-coloured kind, of large size—from
Biskra, in Algeria (Fig. 15). The poison-gland and sac are double,
and contained in the last joint of the tail, which is swollen, and ends
in a splendid curved spine or sting. The scorpion carries its tail raised

in a graceful curve over its back, and strikes with the sting by a
powerful forward stroke. One can seize the tail by the last joint but
one, and thus safely hold the animal, and see the poison exude in
drops from the perforated sting. I found that if I pressed the sting
thus held into the scorpion’s own body, or into that of another
scorpion, no harm resulted to the wounded animal, although plenty
of the poison entered the little wound made by the sting. A large
cockroach or a mouse similarly wounded by the sting was paralysed,
and died in a few minutes. It is a custom in countries where
scorpions abound, and are troublesome, and even dangerous to
human life, for the natives to make a circle of red-hot charcoal, and
to place a large scorpion in the centre of the enclosed area. The
scorpion, it is stated, runs round inside the circle, and, finding that
escape is impossible, deliberately drives its sting into its back, and so
commits suicide. My experiments showed that the scorpion could not
kill itself in this way, as its poison does not act on itself. Moreover, it
has been shown by Professor Bourne, of Madras, that although
scorpions constantly fight with one another, they never attempt to
use their stings in these battles, but only their powerful, lobster-like
claws. The stings would be useless, and are reserved for their
attacks on animals susceptible to the poison. I also found the ground
for the belief that the scorpion kills itself when enclosed in a fiery
circle. Incredible as it may appear in regard to such denizens of the
hot regions of the earth, both the desert scorpion and the large
dark-green Indian scorpions actually faint and become motionless
and insensible when exposed for a few minutes to a temperature a
little above that of the human body. This was carefully ascertained
by using an incubator and a thermometer. The scorpion in the fiery
circle lashes about with its sting, and then suddenly faints owing to
the heat. If removed from the heat it recovers completely; but, of
course, when it is supposed to have committed suicide, no one takes
the trouble to remove it. I made, several times, the actual
experiment of placing a large active scorpion within a ring-like wall,
a foot in diameter, formed by live coals. The scorpion never stung
itself. On one occasion it walked out over the coals, and on other

occasions, after lashing its tail and running about, fainted, and
became motionless.
Jelly-fishes are often called “sea-nettles,” because of the microscopic
poison-bearing threads which they discharge from their skin. These
are used to paralyse their prey, and, in a few kinds only, are
sufficiently powerful to cause a “stinging” effect when they come
into contact with a bather’s skin. Sea-anemones are also armed with
these minute threads, and their poison has been extracted and
studied. The spines of star-fishes and sea-urchins have a very deadly
poison associated with them, which has recently been examined.
Among insects we have the bees, wasps, and ants, with their
terminal stings; caterpillars, with poisonous hairs; gnats, with
poisonous mouth glands. Residents in mosquito-infested countries
become “immune” to the poison of gnat-bite, but not to the deadly
germs of malaria and yellow fever carried by the gnats. The
centipedes have powerful jaws, provided with poison-sacs; the
spiders have stabbing claws, fitted with poison-glands. Shell-fish,
such as crabs and lobsters, do not possess stings or poison-sacs, but
some of the whelk-like sea-snails have poison-glands, which secrete
a fluid deadly to other shell-fish. We have already spoken of the
poison-spines of fishes; among reptiles it is only some of the snakes
which are poisonous, and are known to have poison-glands
connected with grooved fangs. Only one kind of lizard—the
Heloderm of North America, already mentioned—has poison-glands
in its mouth, but it has no special poison-fangs, only small teeth.
There is a most persistent and curious popular error to the effect
that the rapidly moving bifid tongue of snakes and lizards is a
“sting.” It is really quite innocuous. No sting is known among birds,
although some have fighting “spurs” on the leg, and “claws” on the
wing.
Only the lowest of the mammals or warm-blooded hairy quadrupeds
—namely, the Australian duck-mole (Ornithorhynchus) and the spiny
ant-eater (Echidna)—have poison-glands and related “spurs,” or
stings. They have on the hind-leg a “spur” of great size and
strength, which is perforated and connected with a gland which

produces a poisonous milky fluid. Recent observations, however, as
to the poisonous character of this fluid are wanting. Many mammals
have large sac-like glands, which open by definite apertures, in some
cases between the toes, in others upon the legs, at the side or back
of the head (the elephant), in the middle of the back or about the
tail. The fluid secreted by these glands is not poisonous nor acrid,
but odoriferous, and seems to serve to attract the individuals of a
species to one another. They resemble in structure and often in
position the poison-glands of the spurs of the duck-mole and spiny
ant-eater.
Many insects produce a good deal of irritation, and even dangerous
sores, by biting and burrowing in the human skin, without secreting
any active poison. Often they introduce microscopic germs of
disease in this way from one animal to another, as, for instance, do
gnats, tsetze-flies, and horse-flies, and as do some small kinds of
tics. The bites of the flea, of midges, gnats, and bugs are
comparatively harmless unless germs of disease are introduced by
them, an occurrence which, though exceptional, is yet a great and
terrible danger. We now know that it is in this way, and this way
only, that malaria or ague, yellow fever, plague, sleeping-sickness,
and some other diseases are carried from infected to healthy men.
Various diseases of horses and cattle are propagated in the same
way. The mere bites of insects may be treated with an application of
carbolic acid dissolved in camphor. The pain caused by the acid
stings of bees, wasps, ants, and nettles can be alleviated by dabbing
the wound with weak ammonia (hartshorn). Insects which bury
themselves in the skin, such as the jigger-flea of the West Indies
and tropical Africa, should be dug out with a needle or fine blade.
The minute creature, like a cheese-mite, which burrows and breeds
in the skin of man and causes the affliction known as the itch must
be poisoned by sulphurous acid—a result achieved by rubbing the
skin freely with sulphur ointment on two or three successive days. A
serious pest in the summer in many parts of England is a little
animal known as the harvest-man. These are the young of a small
red spider-like creature, called Trombidium. They get on to the feet

of persons walking in the grass, and crawl up the legs and burrow
into the tender skin. Benzine will keep them away if applied to the
ankles or stockings when they are about, and will also destroy them
once they have effected a lodgment.
Fig. 15 bis.—A. Highly magnified drawing of a stinging hair
of the common nettle. The hair is seen to be a single cell or
capsule of large size, tapering to its extremity, but ending in
a little knob. The hard case e is filled with liquid a, and is

lined with slimy granular “protoplasm” b, which extends in
threads across the cavity to the “nucleus” c. The ordinary
small cells of the nettle leaf are marked d. B shows the
knobbed end of the stinging hair, and the way in which,
owing to the thinness of its walls, it breaks off along the line
xy when pressed, leaving a sharp projecting edge, which
penetrates the skin of an animal, whilst the protoplasm p,
distended with poisonous liquid, is shown in C, issuing from
the broken end. It would escape in this way when the sharp,
freshly broken end had penetrated some animal’s skin.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] Since the above was written, I have seen the account by an
American physician—in a recently issued volume of Osler’s
Treatise on Medicine—of his recent discovery of the grass which
produces in its pollen the poison of hay fever, and of the
preparation by him of an anti-toxin which appears to give relief to
those who suffer from hay fever.

XIII
THE DRAGON: A FANCY OR A FACT
I am about to write of loathly dragons, “gorgons and hydras and
chimæras dire.” Every one knows what a dragon looks like, though
probably most people could not give a minute description of the
beast. A number of quite distinct creatures, some living on land,
some in sea, are spoken of in the Bible by a word which is translated
as “dragon.” The ancient Welsh chieftains, like many fighting princes
of old days, bore a “dragon” on their banners, and were themselves
called “dragons” (Pen-dragon), and when a knight slew such a
chieftain fabulous stories grew up as to his combat with and
slaughter of a “dragon.”
The complete, legitimate dragon of the present day is the dragon of
heraldry, which is maintained in proper form and with authorised
attributes by the Heralds’ College. I have a drawing of this “official”
beast before me (Fig. 16). He is represented as of large size, but
whether theoretically the heralds of to-day consider him to be as
large as a lion or ten times as long and tall I do not know. His body is
lizard-like, and covered with scales resembling those of some lizards
(unlike a crocodile in this respect). His head is not unlike that of a
crocodile, excepting that he has a short, sharp horn on his nose, and
a beard on his chin, and also a pair of large pointed ears which no
living reptile possesses. His mouth is open, showing teeth like those
of a crocodile, and from it issues a remarkable tongue, terminating in
an arrow-head-shaped weapon (presumably a “sting”) unlike
anything known in any living animal. His tail is very long and snake-
like (an important fact when we come to consider his ancestry), and
is thrown into coils. It terminates in an arrow-head-shaped structure
like that of the tongue, quite unlike anything known in any real

animal. He has four powerful limbs, which are not like those of a
lizard or a crocodile. They resemble those of an eagle, and have
grasping toes and claws, three directed forward and one backward.
In addition, he has a pair of wings, which are leathery, and supported
by several parallel bars, a structure which gives the wings a remote
resemblance to those of a bat. The wing is quite unlike that of a
pterodactyle (the great extinct flying lizard), and has no resemblance
whatever to that of a bird, which is, of course, formed by separate
quill feathers set in a row on the bones of the fore-arm and hand.
The wings are always represented (even in illegitimate and Oriental
dragons) as much too small to carry the dragon in flight. The dragon
has, further, a crest of separate triangular plates set in a row along
the mid-line of his back, extending from his head to the end of his
tail. Some lizards (but not crocodiles) have such a crest. The most
like it is that of the New Zealand lizard, called the Sphenodon.
Fig. 16.—The heraldic dragon: observe the bat-like wings, the
ears, the horned nose, the beard, the arrow-like tongue and
tail-piece, the scaly body, the dorsal crest, the snake-like tail
with its unnatural arrow-like termination.

Fig. 17.—The heraldic griffin. It alone of the dragon-like
monsters has feathery wings.
Fig. 18.—Hercules destroying the hydra (copied from an
ancient Greek vase).
Such is the creature called “the” dragon. But heraldry recognises
some other terrible beasts allied to the dragon; in fact, what
zoologists would call “allied species.” The griffin, for instance (Fig.
17), is a four-legged beast like the dragon, but has the beak and
wings and forefeet of an eagle, and the hind-legs and tail of a lion.
The heraldic hydra is a dragon, such as I have above described, but

with seven heads and necks. The ancient Greek representation of the
hydra destroyed by Hercules (as painted on vases) was, on the
contrary, based upon the octopus, or eight-armed cuttle-fish, each
arm carrying a snake-like head (Fig. 18). The wyvern is an important
variety of the dragon tribe, well known to heralds, but not to be seen
every day. It so far conforms to natural laws that it has only two legs,
the fore-limbs being the wings (Fig. 19). The true dragon and the
griffin, like the angel of ecclesiastical art, have actually six limbs—
namely, a pair of fore-legs or arms, a pair of hind-legs, and, in
addition, a pair of wings. Occasionally an artist (even in ancient
Egyptian works of art) has attempted to avoid this redundance of
limbs by representing an angel as having the arms themselves
provided with an expanse of quill feathers. This is certainly a less
extraordinary arrangement than the outgrowth of wings (which in
birds, bats, and pterodactyles actually are the modified arms or fore-
limbs), as an extra pair of limbs rooted in the back. The wyvern and
the cockatrice and the basilisk (Fig. 20) (which, like the Gorgon
Medusa, can strike a man dead by the mere glance of the eye) are
remarkable for conforming to the invariable vertebrate standard of no
more than two pairs of limbs, whether legs, wings, or fins. The name
“lind-worm” is given to a wyvern without wings (hence the Linton
Worm and the Laidley Worm of Lambton), and appears in various
heraldic devices and in legendary art; whilst in the arms of the
Visconti of Milan we climb down to a quite simple serpent-like
creature without legs or wings, known as the “guivre.”

Fig. 19.—The heraldic wyvern.
Fig. 20.—The heraldic basilisk, also called the Amphysian
Cockatrice. Observe the second head at the end of its tail—a
feature due to perversion of the observation that there are
some snake-like creatures (Amphisbena) with so simple a
head that it is at first sight difficult to say which end of the
creature is the head and which is the tail.
Without looking further into the strange and fantastic catalogue of
imaginary monsters, one must recognise that it is a matter of great
interest to trace the origin of these marvellous creations of human
fancy, and the way in which they have first of all been brought into
pictorial existence, and then variously modified and finally
stereotyped and maintained by tradition and art. It has not

infrequently been suggested, since geologists made us acquainted
with the bones of huge and strange-looking fossil reptiles dug from
ancient rocks, that the tradition of “the dragon” is really a survival of
the actual knowledge and experience of these extinct monsters on
the part of “long-ago races of men.” It is a curious fact, mentioned by
a well-known writer, Mrs. Jameson, that the bones of a great fossil
reptile were preserved and exhibited at Aix in France as the bones of
the dragon slain by St. Michael, just as the bones of a whale are
shown as those of the mythical Dun-cow of Warwick in that city.
There are three very good reasons for not entertaining the
suggestion that the tradition of the dragon and similar beasts is due
to human co-existence with the great reptiles of the past. The first is
that the age of the rocks known as cretaceous and jurassic (or
oölitic), in which are found the more or less complete skeletons of
the great saurians—many bigger in the body than elephants, and
with huge tails in addition, iguanodon, megalosaurus, diplodocus, as
well as the winged pterodactyles (see Plate II., where a
representation is given of what we know as to the form and bearing
of two species of pterodactyle) and a vast series of such creatures—is
so enormously remote that not only man but all the hairy warm-
blooded animals like him, did not come into existence until many
millions of years after these rocks had been deposited by water and
the great reptiles buried in them had become extinct. The cave-men
of the Pleistocene period are modern, even close to us, as compared
with the age when the great saurians flourished. That was just before
the time when our chalk-cliffs were being formed as a slowly growing
sediment on the floor of a deep sea. No accurate measure of the time
which has elapsed since then is possible, but we find that about 200
ft. thickness of deposit has been accumulated since the date of the
earliest human remains known to us—whilst over 5000 ft. have
accumulated since the chalk began to be deposited, and the great
saurians ceased to exist. If we reckon, in accordance with the most
moderate estimate, a quarter of a million years for the upper 200 ft.
of deposit or human period (Pleistocene), we must suppose that
twenty or thirty times as long a period has elapsed to allow time for

the deposit of the 5000 ft. of sand and rock since the great saurians
ceased to exist. This would be some six or seven million years—a
long while for tradition to run, even supposing man existed all that
time, which he did not. And the probability is that this estimate of the
time is far too small: a hundred million years is nearer the truth.
PLATE II
REAL DRAGONS
THE EXTINCT FLYING REPTILES KNOWN AS PTERODACTYLES. THEIR BONES AND
WING MEMBRANES ARE PRESERVED IN THE OOLITIC ROCKS. SOME MEASURED
EIGHTEEN FEET ACROSS THE EXPANDED WINGS.
From “Extinct Animals,” by Sir Ray Lankester. (Constable & Co.)
Suppose that man came into existence as an intelligent creature,
capable of handing on a tradition, as much as half a million or even a
million years before the date of the remains of the earliest cave-men

discovered in Europe, we yet get no long way down the avenue of
past time. Man would still be separated by millions of years and long
ages of change and development of the forms of animal life on the
earth’s surface, from the period of the great reptiles or saurians who
flourished before the chalk was deposited. And there is good
evidence that none of those great saurians survived the date of the
chalk. They died out and their place was taken by the earliest
ancestors of elephants, rhinoceroses, horses, cattle, lions, and
monkeys, from which in the course of ages the animals we know by
those names were developed, whilst very late in the history man was
produced. The reptiles continued as small, furtive creatures—the
lizards and a few biggish snakes and crocodiles—but no descendants
of “the great Dinosaurs” survived.
Another reason against the supposed survival of a real tradition of
dragons is that, even in regard to much later—immensely later—
creatures, such as the mammoth or hairy elephant, which we know
was contemporary with man, there is no real tradition. The natives of
the sub-arctic regions in which the skeletons and whole carcases of
the mammoth are found in a frozen state, and from whence many
hundreds of tusks of the mammoth have been since the earliest
times yearly exported and used in Europe as ivory, have no “tradition”
of these creatures. They have fanciful stories about the ghosts of the
mammoths, but they call their tusks “horns,” and have no legends of
the monster as a living thing. The use of mammoth’s ivory in
Northern Europe dates back for a thousand years historically, and
probably has never ceased since the days of the cave-men. Three
years ago I examined the richly carved drinking horn of a
Scandinavian hero, dating from the tenth century, and preserved
amongst the treasures of York Minster, and I have little doubt that it
is fashioned from the tusk of a mammoth.
A third reason for rejecting any connection of the dragon with a real
reminiscence of the great extinct saurians is that its origin and its
gradual building up in human fancy can be traced in the same way as
that of many other fanciful and legendary creatures by reference to
the regular operation of the imagination in successive ages of

mankind. All races of men have imagined monsters by combining into
one several parts of different animals. The centaur of the Greeks is a
blend of man and horse, the great “divine” chimera of the Greeks
was a two-headed blend of lion and goat, and any such mixed
creature is technically called nowadays “a chimera”. The dragon is
classed by heralds as a chimera. Sometimes one of these imaginary
beasts has its origin in a terrible or weird animal, which really exists
in some distant land, and is celebrated or even worshipped by the
inhabitants of that distant land, whose descriptions of it are carried in
a distorted and exaggerated form to regions where it does not exist.
Fig. 21.—The Chinese Imperial Dragon, from a drawing on a
tile of the old Imperial Palace of Nankin. It has five claws. No
one outside the Imperial service may use it, under penalty of
death. Ordinary people have to be content with a four-
clawed dragon. Compare this with the European heraldic
dragon, Fig. 16.
Fig. 22.—A flying snake with two pairs of wings—a “fabulous”
creature thus drawn in an ancient Chinese work, the “Shan

Hai King.” This book dates from about 350 a.d., but probably
is based on records of a thousand years’ earlier date.
The dragon appears to be nothing more nor less in its origin than one
of the great snakes (pythons), often 25 ft. in length, which inhabit
tropical India and Africa. Its dangerous character and terrible
appearance and movement impressed primitive mankind, and
traditions of it have passed with migrating races both to the East and
to the West, so that we find the mythical dragon in ancient China and
in Japan, no less than in Egypt and in Greece. It retains its snake-like
body and tail, especially in the Chinese and Japanese representations
(Figs. 21 and 22); but in both East and West, legs and wings have
been gradually added to it for the purpose of making it more terrible
and expressing some of its direful qualities. Chinese traditions
indicate the mountains of Central Asia as the home of the dragon,
whilst the ancient Greeks considered it to have come from the East.
As a matter of fact, the Greek word “drakon” actually meant plainly
and simply a large snake, and is so used by Aristotle and other
writers. There is a beautiful Greek vase-painting (Fig. 23) showing
the dragon which guarded the golden apples of the Hesperides as
nothing more than a gigantic snake (without legs or wings), coiled
round the trunk of the tree on which the apples are growing (like the
later pictures of the serpent on the apple tree in the Garden of Eden),
whilst the ladylike Hesperides are politely welcoming the robust
Hercules to their garden.

Fig. 23.—The dragon guarding the tree in the garden of the
Hesperides on which grew the golden apples, in quest of
which, according to Greek legend, the hero Hercules went.
The drawing is copied from an ancient Greek vase, and the
original includes figures of the Hesperides and of Hercules,
not reproduced here.
The worship and propitiation of the serpent is an immensely old form
of religion (antecedent to Judaism), and exists, or has existed, in
both the old world and the new. The Egyptians revered a great
serpent-god called “Ha-her,” or “great Lord of fear and terror”; to him
the wicked were handed over after death to be bitten and tortured.

The evil spirit in the Scandinavian mythology was a huge snake—and
the connection, not to say confusion, of the terrible snake with the
dragon on the part of the early Christians is shown by the words in
Revelation xx. 1, 2, “the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil,
and Satan.” The mediæval devil with goat’s feet retained the dragon’s
tail with its curious triangular termination.
To the Greeks and Romans snakes were not such very terrible
creatures, since the kinds found in South Europe are small and
harmless—only the viper being poisonous—and they regarded the
serpent as a beneficent creature, the familiar of Esculapius the god of
medicine, companion of the household gods (the Lares), and
guardian of sacred places, tombs, and concealed treasure (Fig. 27).
The snake was the special earth-god, subterranean in habit, cunning,
subtle, and gifted with powers of divination. The conception of the
serpent as an avenging monster kept continually thrusting itself from
the East into the popular mythology of the Greeks, and finally led to
the building up of the dragon as a winged and clawed creature
distinct from the harmless but cunning snake familiar to them. Even
in India there arose a sort of double attitude towards the snake (as is
not uncommon in regard to deities). On the one hand he was
regarded as all that was terrible, destructive, and evil, and on the
other as amiable, kindly, and wise. The services of the beautiful rat-
snake in destroying house rats rendered him and his kind welcome
and valued guests. In Egypt we find representations of small winged
snakes without legs, and the ancient traveller, Herodotus, believed
that they represented real creatures, as did the Roman naturalist,
Pliny. Very probably the belief in winged snakes is due to the
similarity of the snake and the eel in general form, since the paired
fins of the eel close to the head (see Figs. 24 and 25) correspond in
position with the wings shown in the Egyptian drawings of winged
serpents. The particular form of winged snake pictured on Egyptian
monuments (see Figs. 26, 27) appears to me to be a realisation of
stories and fancies based on real experience of the locust. It was the
terrible and destructive locust of which Herodotus tells—calling it “a
winged serpent.” The Egyptian pictures of winged serpents have

wings resembling those of an insect (see Figs. 26 and 27), and
sometimes they are represented with one and sometimes with two
pairs.
Fig. 24.—A votive tablet (ancient Rome) showing what is
meant for a snake, but has been “improved” by the addition
of fins like those of the eel.
Fig. 25.—Ancient Roman painting of a so-called marine
serpent—really an eel-like fish—inaccurately represented.
The fins show how, from such pictures, the belief in winged
serpents might take its origin.
Aristotle says that, as a matter of common report in his time, there
were winged serpents in Africa. Herodotus, on the contrary, says
there were none except in Arabia, and he went across the Red Sea
from the city of Bats in order to see them. He did not, however,
succeed in doing so, though he says he saw their dead bodies and
bones. He says that they hang about the trees in vast numbers, are
of small size and varied colour, and that they are kept in check by the

bird known as the Ibis, which on that account is held sacred, since
they increase so rapidly that unless devoured they would render it
impossible for man to maintain himself on the earth. They invade
Egypt in swarms, flying across the Red Sea. All this agrees with my
suggestion that the winged “serpents” heard of by Herodotus were
really locusts; and the creature drawn in Fig. 27 may well be a locust
transformed by fancy into a winged snake.
Fig. 26.—Egyptian four-winged serpent—as drawn on ancient
Egyptian temples.
Fig. 27.—Two-winged serpent, symbolic of the goddess
Eileithya, from a drawing on an Egyptian temple.
It would be a very interesting but a lengthy task to trace out the
origin and history of the various traditional monsters, such as the
basilisk, the gorgon, the cockatrice, the salamander, and the
epimacus, which have come into European legend and belief, and to
give some account of the special deadly qualities of each. St. Michael
and St. George slaughtering each his dragon and rescuing a lovely
maiden from its clutches are only appropriations by the new religion
of the similar deeds ascribed to Greek heroes, such as Hercules,

Bellerophon, and Perseus. Often a belief in the existence of a
monster has arisen by a misunderstanding, on the part of a credulous
people, of a drawing or carving showing a strange mixture of the
leading characteristics of different animals, which was meant by the
man who made it to be only symbolic of a combination of qualities.
Just as the Latins and mediæval people credulously accepted Greek
symbolic monsters as real, and transmuted Greek heroes into
Christian saints, so were the Greeks themselves deluded by strange
carvings and blood-curdling legends which reached them at various
dates from mysterious Asia into a belief in the actual existence of a
variety of fantastic monsters. “The Greeks,” says M. E. Pottier, a
distinguished French writer on Greek mythology, “often copied
Oriental representations without understanding them.” The
conventional dragon probably came from Indian sources through
Persia to China, on the one hand, spreading eastwards, and to the
Latins of the early Roman Empire, on the other hand, spreading
westwards; but at what date exactly it is difficult to make out.
In mediæval, as well as in earlier times, marvellous beasts were
brought into imaginary existence by the somewhat unscrupulous
enterprise of an artist in giving pictorial expression to the actual
words by which some traveller described a strange beast seen by him
in a foreign land. Thus the “unicorn,” which was really the rhinoceros,
was seen by travellers in the earliest times, and was described as an
animal like a horse, but with a single horn growing from its forehead.
The heraldic draughtsman accordingly takes the spirally twisted
narwhal’s tusk, brought from the northern seas by adventurous
mariners (the narwhal being called “the unicorn fish”) as his unicorn’s
horn, and plants it on the forehead of a horse, and says, “Behold! the
unicorn.” Meanwhile the real “unicorn,” the rhinoceros, became
properly known as navigation and Eastern travel extended, and true
unicorns’ horns, the horns of the rhinoceros, richly carved and made
into drinking cups, not at all like the narwhal’s tusk, were brought to
Europe from India. One was sent to Charles ii. by “the Great Sophy,”
and handed over to the Royal Society by the King for experiment.
These horns were asserted to be the most powerful antidote or

destroyer of poison, and a test for the presence of poison in drink.
There was no truth whatever in the assertion, as the Royal Society at
once showed. Yet they were valued at enormous prices, and pieces
were sold for their weight in gold. A German traveller in the time of
Queen Elizabeth saw one which was kept among the Queen’s jewels
at Windsor, and was valued, according to this writer, at £10,000.
Credulity, fancy, and hasty judgment are accountable for the belief in
mythical and legendary monsters. Yet they have great interest for the
scientific study of the growth of human thought and of the
relationships of the races of mankind. They are often presented to us
in beautiful stories, carvings, or pictures, having a childlike sincerity
and a concealed symbolism which give to the wondrous creatures
charm and human value.

XIV
OYSTERS
Oysters are delicate morsels—still appreciated by that class of the
population which nevertheless shudders at the thought of eating the
high-flavoured “whilk” or the gristly “periwinkle,” and neglects the
admirable mussel, so rightly valued by our French friends. There are
a number of interesting facts about the nature and life-history of
oysters, and the different kinds of them—a knowledge of which does
not diminish, but, on the contrary, rather adds to the pleasure with
which one swallows the shell-fish. I remember the time when
“natives” were sold in London at sixpence the score. When I was a
schoolboy at St. Paul’s they were no more than sixpence a dozen at
the best shops in Cheapside. That inevitable form of British enterprise
which is known as “monopoly,” many years since laid hold of the
oyster business, and rapidly raised the price of the best natives to
eight times what it had been, while the typhoid “scare” came
subsequently as a sort of poetical justice, and threatened to ruin the
oyster monopolists. As a matter of fact, there is no difficulty in
freeing oysters from any possible contamination by the typhoid germ.
They have only to be kept for ten days or a fortnight in large tanks of
sea-water of unquestionable purity—after removal from the fattening
grounds (tanks or waterways), and they rid themselves of any
possible infection. It is the interest of the oyster merchant to make
sure that this treatment is strictly enforced. It is a noteworthy fact
that the anciently established habit of drenching an oyster with
vinegar before eating it is precisely the best treatment, except
cooking them, which could have been adopted in order to destroy the
vitality of typhoid germs—although the existence of such germs was

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Episcopal Elections In Late Antiquity Bilingual Johan Leemans Editor

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