This course focuses to some extent on phenomena but primarily on opposition: how one side saw the other, how each side saw differences within as well as without, what people said and what they did, how they defined their beliefs and practices not absolutely but in view of others'. What is at issue is what the ancients believed was true of themselves and true of what they revered, and what they believed was true of others.

This syllabus is still in flux! Do not print it out!

Texts (also all on reserve under Classics 195):

Other works on reserve at the library

Other resources:

List of Roman Emperors from Augustus to Heraclius

The very useful De Imperatoribus Romanis

Ancient Sources

There are translated texts of many of the early church fathers as well as Eutropius' Breviarium and some of the orations of Julian and Libanius, letters from Libanius to Julian, Eunapius of Sardis Lives of the Philosophers and Sophists, Ammianus Marcellinus, and Zosimus at tertullian.org and translated texts of many of the church fathers at New Advent

Lacus Curtius has a variety of texts and other features

Paul Halsall's Internet Medieval Sourcebook also contains a variety of texts relating to the end of the classical world and Byzantine history

General Bibliography

Assigned readings should be done before the class on the day listed for the reading(s). Assigned readings are whatever things are listed immediately under the date and topic, one indent space in from the left margin. Any titles, bibliographies, or links further indented are suggestions for further reading or research and are not required for class.

For specific course requirements look near end of the syllabus. Information on final projects

How to decipher bibliographical references in this syllabus:

UVM library has an online subscription to APh. To find it, choose the link Articles & More on the main library page, then the letter A in the alphabet.

There is also a print edition of APh through 2004, shelved in Reference Z7016 .A56. Here are instructions for using the print edition, which for some things (e.g., personal names) is better than the electronic version.

Office hours:  9:30-10:30 MWF

Herodotus selections from book 4 on people who live to the north: 4.13-16 (Aristeas), 4.32-36 (Hyperboreans and Abaris), 4.94-96 (Getae; Zalmoxis and Pythagoras); all can be found here: Herodotus Book 4
Porphyry Life of Pythagoras

Map of the Eastern Mediterranean

See also Arthur Stanley Pease, "Some Aspects of Invisibility," HSPh 53 (1942) 1-36
E.R. Dodds, The Greeks and the Irrational (1951) 135-156. BF1421 .D6
Mircea Eliade and Willard R. Trask, "Zalmoxis," HR 11 (1972) 257-302
Olga R. Aranovsky, "On the Interpretation of the 'knowledge by suffering' in Aeschylus, Agamemnon (176-183)," JIES 6 (1978) 243-262
J.P. Brown, "The Mediterranean Seer and Shamanism," ZATW 93 (1981) 374-400 [52-10582
Fritz Graf, "Orpheus. A Poet Among Men," in Interpretations of Greek Mythology (1986) 80-106. BL782 .I58 1986
G. Huxley, "Aristeas and the Cyzicene," GRBS 27 (1986) 151-155

Selections from Livy's history and Cicero De natura deorum (will be sent via e-mail)
MacMullen CRE chapter 1

Map of the Roman Empire

See also Nathan Rosenstein, "War, Failure, and Aristocratic Competition," CPh 85 (1990) 255-265
Pauline Ripat, "Roman Omens, Roman Audiences, and Roman History," G&R 53 (2006) 155-174

Sourcebook 1.4, 1.8-1.9
Valerius Maximus 1.7 and 1.8 (will be sent via e-mail)

See also Dodds chapter 2
J.S. Hanson, "Dreams and Visions in the Graeco-Roman World and Early Christianity," in ANRW II.23.2 (1980) 1395-1427 DG209 .T36
William V. Harris, Dreams and Experience in Classical Antiquity (2009). BF1078 .H2955 2009

Sourcebook 1.1-1.3, 1.5-1.7, chapters 2 and 3 entire
A pagan exorcism
A betting person's curse tablet (scroll down a bit, carefully, for the picture)
A lead curse tablet in Johns Hopkins Archaeological Museum

The Syrian Goddess (will be sent via e-mail)
Sourcebook 4.1-4.2, 7.8

See also P&C pp. 27-101 [on reserve]
H. Musurillo, "Pillar-climbers in the Early Church, East and West," CF 15 (1961) 115-118 [32-08414
David T.M. Frankfurter, "Stylites and Phallobates: Pillar Religion in Late Antique Syria," VChr 44 (1990) 168-198
Per Bilde, "Atargatis/Dea Syria: Hellenization of Her Cult in the Hellenistic-Roman Period?," in Religion and Religious Practice in the Seleucid Kingdom, edd. Per Bilde, Troels Engberg-Pedersen, Lise Hannestad, and Jan Zahle (1990) 151-187. BL1060 .R43 1990
Lucinda Dirven, "The Author of 'De Dea Syria' and His Cultural Heritage," Numen 44 (1997) 153-179
Jas Elsner, "Describing Self in the Language of Other: Pseudo (?) Lucian at the Temple of Hierapolis," in Being Greek Under Rome: Cultural Identity, the Second Sophistic and the Development of Empire, ed. Simon Goldhill (2001) 123-153. DG78 B385 2001
Jane L. Lightfoot, "Sacred Eunuchism in the Cult of the Syrian Goddess," in Eunuchs in Antiquity and Beyond, ed. Shaun Tougher (2002) 71-86 [76-14493
Patrick J. Finglass, "Autocastration or Regicide?: Lucian, De dea syria 20," CQ 55 (2005) 629-632

Sourcebook 4.3-end, 7.1-7.7, 7.9-7.10
Read Lucian Voyage to the Lower World and Runaways at one of these sites:
The Lucian of Samosata Project
Internet Sacred Text Archive
eBooks@Adelaide

See also P&C pp. 102-167 [on reserve]

Keith Hopkins, "Divine Emperors or the Symbolic Unity of the Roman Empire," in Conquerors and Slaves (1978) 197-242
D.L. Jones, "Christianity and the Roman Imperial Cult," in ANRW II.23.2 (1980) 1023-1054 DG209 .T36

See also (if interested) Old translation of the Apocolocyntosis or Not quite so old translation of the Apocolocyntosis
Andrew Runni Anderson, "Heracles and His Successors: A Study of a Heroic Ideal and the Recurrence of a Heroic Type," HSPh 39 (1928) 7-58
S.R.F. Price, Rituals and Power. The Roman Imperial Cult in Asia Minor (1984)

Sourcebook 14
Tacitus Annals 15.40-44
MacMullen CRE chapter 2
Wilken chapters 1-3

See also P&C pp. 265-335 [on reserve]
S. Benko, "Pagan Criticism of Christianity During the First Two Centuries A.D.," in ANRW II.23.2 (1980) 1055-1118 DG209 .T36

Lucian Alexander the Oracle-Monger (Sourcebook chapter 10) and The Death of Peregrine (see links for Lucian above under 14 September)

Alexander the Oracle-Monger was in Fortean Times in June 2011

Sourcebook 11
Introduction to Eunapius (down as far as the part about Iamblichus)
Life of Porphyry
Life of Iamblichus

Read one of these articles before the end of next week (meaning by class time on 30 September):
Roger Pack, "The 'Volatilization' of Peregrinus Proteus," AJPh 67 (1946) 334-345
G. Bagnani, "Peregrinus Proteus and the Christians," Historia 4 (1955) 107-112
R.B. Branham, "The Comic as Critic, Revenging Epicurus. A Study of Lucian's Art of Comic Narrative," ClAnt 3 (1984) 143-163
Mark J. Edwards, "Satire and Verisimilitude. Christianity in Lucian's Peregrinus," Historia 38 (1989) 89-98
Diskin Clay, "Lucian of Samosata: Four Philosophical Lives (Nigrinus, Demonax, Peregrinus, Alexander Pseudomantis)," ANRW II.36.5 (1992) 3406-3450 DG209 .T36
John Elsner, "Hagiographic Geography: Travel and Allegory in the Life of Apollonius of Tyana," JHS 117 (1997) 22-37
Silvia Montiglio, "Wandering Philosophers in Classical Greece," JHS 120 (2000) 86-105
Matthew W. Dickie, "Divine Epiphany in Lucian's Account of the Oracle of Alexander of Abonuteichos," ICS 29 (2004) 159-182. PA1 .I43

You can read the whole Life of Apollonius of Tyana online

Sourcebook 8
Books 9-12 of Marcus Aurelius Meditations at Project Gutenberg or The Internet Classics Archive

Sourcebook 15
MacMullen CRE chapter 3
Kofsky chapter 1 [on reserve]
Rebecca Lyman, "The Politics of Passing: Justin Martyr's Conversion as a Problem of 'Hellenization'," in Conversion in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages: Seeing and Believing, edd. Kenneth Mills and Anthony Grafton (2003) 36-60 [on reserve]

October
3  Early persecutions

Sourcebook 18.1-4
De mortibus persecutorum 1-6

See also P&C pp. 419-492 [on reserve]
Paul Keresztes, "The Imperial Roman Government and the Christian Church I. From Nero to the Severi," in ANRW II.23.1 (1979) 247-315 DG209 .T36

Read about cosmic collisions and location of the axis of evil and while you're at it, admire the King James bible in a new form

Unusual view of the Pantheon

Wilken chapters 4-5

See also R.P.C. Hanson, "The Christian Attitude to Pagan Religions up to the Time of Constantine the Great," in ANRW II.23.2 (1980) 910-973 DG209 .T36

Some bibliography relating to the early Christian church and Rome
Hagiographies
More hagiographies

Wilken chapter 6
Sourcebook 18.5-14
MacMullen CRE chapter 4
Lellia Cracco Ruggini, "Intolerance: Equal and Less Equal in the Roman World," CPh 82 (1987) 187-205

See also James Boykin Rives, "The Decree of Decius and the Religion of Empire," JRS 89 (1999) 135-154
P&C pp. 549-608 [on reserve]
Paul Keresztes, "The Imperial Roman Government and the Christian Church II. From Gallienus to the Great Persecution," in ANRW II.23.1 375-386 DG209 .T36

12  Jovius and Herculius

Panegyric of 289

Some bibliography on Diocletian and the tetrarchy

De mortibus persecutorum 7-30
Brown Rise chapter 2 [on reserve]

A Narrative: Gallienus to Theodosius I

See also Elizabeth DePalma Digeser, The Making of a Christian Empire: Lactantius and Rome (2000) BR 65 .L26 D54 2000

Sourcebook 20
MacMullen CRE chapters 5-7
Raymond Van Dam, "The Many Conversions of the Emperor Constantine," in Conversion in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages: Seeing and Believing, edd. Kenneth Mills and Anthony Grafton (2003) 127-151 [on reserve]

See also P&C pp. 609-662 [on reserve]

Recent bibliography on Constantine

Lactantius De mortibus persecutorum 31-52
Eusebius Church History 9.9; Life of Constantine 26-32
A. Momigliano, "Pagan and Christian Historiography in the Fourth Century A.D.," in A. Momigliano, ed., The Conflict between Paganism and Christianity in the Fourth Century (1963) 79-99 [on reserve]
Kofsky chapter 2 [on reserve]

See also G.W. Trompf, Early Christian Historiography: Narratives of Retributive Justice (2000) BR138 .T76 2000
Glenn F. Chesnut, The First Christian Histories: Eusebius, Socrates, Sozomen, Theodoret, and Evagrius (1986) BR166 .C49 1986
Margaret English Frazer, "Hades Stabbed by the Cross of Christ," Metropolitan Museum Journal 9 (1974) 153-161

24  Internal conflicts

Athanasius History of the Arians part I and part VIII
Donatist Martyr Stories pp. 25-60 [on reserve]

See also Athanasius Four Discourses against the Arians, Defence before Constantius, Defence of the Nicene Definition, Defence against the Arians
T.D. Barnes, Athanasius and Constantius: Theology and Politics in the Constantinian Empire (1993) BR1720.A7 B37 1993
W.H.C. Frend, The Donatist Church: a Movement of Protest in Roman North Africa (1971) BT1370 .F7 1971

Julian Letters 19-25, 32, 36, 40-41, 47, 51 (letter 19 starts on page 49; to get there, type 49 into the little box at the top of the screen opposite Page:) (or download the whole volume as a pdf)
Eunapius Life of Maximus
Eunapius Life of Chrysanthius
Wilken chapter 7, Epilogue

See also James J. O'Donnell. "The Demise of Paganism," Traditio 35 (1979) 45-88
A. Meredith, "Porphyry and Julian against the Christians," in ANRW II.23.2. (1980) 1119-1149 DG209 .T36
Brown Society pp. 83-102 [on reserve]

Recent bibliography on Julian

On the Temple of Apollo at Daphne
For the Temples
MacMullen CRE chapters 8-9

See also Funeral Oration for Julian

A.A. Barb, "The Survival of Magic Arts," in A. Momigliano, ed., The Conflict between Paganism and Christianity in the Fourth Century (1963) 100-125 [on reserve]
P. Courcelle, "Anti-Christian Arguments and Christian Platonism," in A. Momigliano, ed., The Conflict between Paganism and Christianity in the Fourth Century (1963) 151-192 [on reserve]
David Potter, "Prophecy and Personal Power in the Roman Empire," in Prophets and Emperors (Cambridge MA 1994) 146-182
Parshia Lee-Stecum, "Dangerous Reputations: Charioteers and Magic in Fourth-Century Rome," G&R 53 (2006) 224-234

See also Daniel Ogden, Magic, Witchcraft, and Ghosts in the Greek and Roman Worlds: A Sourcebook (2009)
D. E. Aune, "Magic in Early Christianity," in ANRW II.23.2 (1980) 1507-1557 DG209 .T36
A. B. Kolenkow, "Relationships between Miracle and Prophecy in the Greco-Roman World and Early Christianity," in ANRW II.23.2 (1980) 1470-1506 DG209 .T36

Ammianus books 15.7, 19.10, 21.1-2, 21.14-16, 22.5, 22.9-14, 23.1, 25.4, 25.10, 27.3 &7, 29.1 and, for extra entertainment, his descriptions of life at Rome: 14.6 and 28.1 & 4
Rolfe translation
Yonge translation

Bibliography on Ammianus

Main page of the Ammianus Marcellinus Online Project
Christianity in Ammianus is a discussion with copious references to passages in the text, and to scholarly opinion; this is the first of three pages

Battle of Adrianople
If you prefer, use the link given above for the Rolfe translation of Ammianus and read 31.12-13 (a little shorter, omits the obituary of Valens)
Herbert Bloch, "The Pagan Revival in the West at the End of the Fourth Century," in A. Momigliano, ed., The Conflict between Paganism and Christianity in the Fourth Century (1963) 193-218 [on reserve]
Brown Rise chapter 1 [on reserve]

See also Noel Lenski, "Initium mali Romano imperio: Contemporary Reactions to the Battle of Adrianople," TAPhA 127 (1997) 129-168

Bibliography on Valentinian and his family

Codex Theodosianus books IX and XVI
Michele Renee Salzman, "Superstitio in the Codex Theodosianus and the Persecution of Pagans," VChr 41 (1987) 172-188

See also A. Ehrhardt, "The First Two Years of the Emperor Theodosius I," JEH 15 (1964) 1-17
Michele Renee Salzman, "The Evidence for the Conversion of the Roman Empire to Christianity in Book 16 of the 'Theodosian Code'," Historia 42 (1993) 362-378
R.M. Errington, "Christian Accounts of the Religious Legislation of Theodosius I," Klio 79 (1997) 398-443 [68-09706
R.M. Errington, "Church and State in the First Years of Theodosius I," Chiron 27 (1997) 21-72 [68-09707
T.D. Barnes, "From Toleration to Repression: the Evolution of Constantine's Religious Policies," SCI 21 (2002) 189-207 [73-11644

On Priscillian and his followers: H. Chadwick, "Priscillian of Avila. Occult and Charisma in the Ancient Church," in Studia Patristica, XV (1984) 3-12. BR41 .I57
Harry O. Maier, "Religious Dissent, Heresy and Households in Late Antiquity," VChr 49 (1995) 49-63
Eszter Spät. "The 'Commonitorium' of Orosius on the Teachings of the Priscillianists," AAntHung 38 (1998) 357-379 [69-03175
Andrew S. Jacobs, "The Disorder of Books: Priscillian's Canonical Defense of Apocrypha," HThR 93 (2000) 135-159

Bibliography on Theodosius and his successors

Symmachus On the Altar of Victory; Ambrose's reply: Ep. 17
A. V. Van Stekelenburg, "Stating the Case of Paganism in 384 AD: Argumentation in the Third Relation of Symmachus," Akroterion 38 (1993) 39-45 [64-05338

See also H.A. Pohlsander, "Victory: The Story of a Statue," Historia 18 (1969) 588-597
Michele Renee Salzman, "Reflections on Symmachus' Idea of Tradition," Historia 38 (1989) 348-364
Willy Evenepoel, "Ambrose vs. Symmachus: Christians and Pagans in AD 384," AncSoc 29 (1998-1999) 283-306 [70-12154
Charles W. Hedrick, History and Silence: Purge and Rehabilitation of Memory in Late Antiquity (2000) CN535 .H43 2000

MacMullen CRE chapters 10-11
R.O.Edbrooke, Jr., "The Visit of Constantius II to Rome in 357 and Its Effect on the Pagan Senatorial Aristocracy" AJPh 97 (1976) 40-61
J.M. Lieu, "The Race of the God-Fearers," JThS 46 (1995) 483-501
Clifford Ando, "Pagan Apologetics and Christian Intolerance in the Ages of Themistius and Augustine," JECS 4 (1996) 171-207

See also MacMullen CP chapter 1

Sulpicius Severus Life of St. Martin
Brown Society pp. 222-250 [on reserve]

See also MacMullen CP chapter 2

J.M. Rist, "Hypatia," Phoenix 19 (1965) 214-225
Mary Ellen Waithe, "Finding Bits and Pieces of Hypatia," in Hypatia's Daughters: Fifteen Hundred Years of Women Philosophers, ed. Linda Lopez McAlister (1996) 4-15. B105.W6 H97 1996
Silvia Ronchey, "Hypatia the Intellectual," in Roman Women, ed. Augusto Fraschetti (2001) 160-189. HQ1136 .R6613 2001
Edward Jay Watts, City and School in Late Antique Athens and Alexandria (2006) 187-203. LA75 .W38 2006

See also Hypatia in the news:
In an article on ancient Alexandria
and one on Hypatia herself

Rutilius Namatianus De reditu suo
D. Jones, "The Sack of Rome," HT 20 (1970) 603-609
Brown Rise chapter 3 [on reserve]

Bibliography on Rutilius Namatianus, and on Romanitas

L.C. Ferrari, "Background to Augustine's City of God," CJ 67 (1972) 198-208
Theodore S. De Bruyn, "Ambivalence Within a 'Totalizing Discourse': Augustine's Sermons on the Sack of Rome," JECS 1 (1993) 405-421
Dennis Trout, "Re-textualizing Lucretia: Cultural Subversion in the City of God," JECS 2 (1994) 53-70
Andrew R. Murphy, "Augustine and the Rhetoric of Roman Decline," HPTh 26 (2005) 586-606

The City of God online in two places:
New Advent
CCEL

Short bibliography on Augustine

Proclus Hymns
Damascius Philosophical History 5-38
Polymnia Athanassiadi, "Persecution and Response in late Paganism: The Evidence of Damascius," JHS 113 (1993) 1-29

See also MacMullen CP chapter 3
Edward Watts, "Doctrine, Anecdote, and Action: Reconsidering the Social History of the Last Platonists (C. 430-C. 550 C.E.)," CPh 106 (2011) 226-244

Zosimus book 2
Walter Goffart, "Zosimus, the First Historian of Rome's Fall," AHR 76 (1971) 412-441

K.W. Harl, "Sacrifice and Pagan Belief in Fifth- and Sixth-Century Byzantium," P&P 128 (1990) 7-27

See also MacMullen CP chapter 4

Projects due

Brown Cult chapters 3 and 4 [on reserve]

Grade will be based upon:
Midterm examination 10 October (25%)
Quizzes (25%)
Student joint projects (25%)
Final examination 9 December 1:30 (25%)