En savoir plus
“Kyle Smith has written a provocative, engaging, and elegant book. . . . [He] demonstrates new possibilities and avenues for constructing the history of Persian Christians in the fourth century and their relationship to Constantine and the Roman Empire.”—Studies in Late Antiquity
“Challenges the standard narrative that Constantine was planning an invasion of Persia to liberate Christians and that Shapur persecuted Persian Christians because he perceived them as fifth columnists loyal to Rome. . . . This book is stimulating.”—Church History
“Smith’s work demonstrates well that our sources tell us more about the way in which their authors wished to remember a past than they tell us about the events of that past.”—Journal of Early Christian Studies
Table des matières
Acknowledgments
Abbreviations
Introduction: Constantine and the Writing of Fourth-Century History
PART I: THE ROMAN FRONTIER AND THE PERSIAN WAR
1 • Patronizing Persians: Constantine’s Letter to Shapur II
2 • Constantine’s Crusade: The Emperor’s Last Days and the Persian Campaign
3 • Rereading Nisibis: Narrating the Battle for Roman Mesopotamia
PART II: ROMAN CAPTIVES AND PERSIAN ENVOYS
4 • On War and Persecution: Aphrahat the Persian Sage and the Martyrdom and History of Blessed Simeon bar Sabba?e
5 • The Church of the East and the Territorialization of Christianity
6 • Memories of Constantine in the Acts of the Persian Martyrs
Appendix A. Constantine’s Letter to Shapur: Eusebius’s Life of Constantine IV.8–14
Appendix B. Martyrdom of the Captives of Beth Zabdai
Appendix C. Martyrdom of Abbot Barshebya, Ten Fellow Brothers, and One Magus
Bibliography
Index
A propos de l'auteur
Kyle Smith is Associate Professor of Historical Studies and Religion at the University of Toronto and the translator of The Martyrdom and History of Blessed Simeon bar Sabba'e.
Résumé
It is widely believed that the Emperor Constantine’s conversion to Christianity politicized religious allegiances, dividing the Christian Roman Empire from the Zoroastrian Sasanian Empire and leading to the persecution of Christians in Persia. This account, however, is based on Greek ecclesiastical histories and Syriac martyrdom narratives that date to centuries after the fact. In this groundbreaking study, Kyle Smith analyzes diverse Greek, Latin, and Syriac sources to show that there was not a single history of fourth-century Mesopotamia. By examining the conflicting hagiographical and historical evidence, Constantine and the Captive Christians of Persia presents an evocative and evolving portrait of the first Christian emperor, uncovering how Syriac Christians manipulated the image of their western Christian counterparts to fashion their own political and religious identities during this century of radical change.
Texte suppl.
"Kyle Smith has written a provocative, engaging, and elegant book. . . .[in which] Smith critiques previous historiography and demonstrates new possibilities and avenues for constructing the history of Persian Christians in the fourth century and their relationship to Constantine and the Roman Empire."
