From Classical Antiquity to the Middle Ages: Urban Public Building in Northern and Central Italy, AD 300-850 0198218982, 9780198218982

Citation preview

OXFORD HISTORICAL MONOGRAPHS E d ito rs M. G. BROCK H. M. M A Y R -H A R T IN G K. V . THOM AS

BARBARA HARVEY H. G. PITT A . F. THOMPSON

FROM CLASSICAL ANTIQUITY TO THE MIDDLE AGES U R B A N P U B L IC B U IL D IN G IN N O R T H E R N A N D C E N T R A L IT A L Y AD

3OO—85O by

BRYAN WARD-PERKINS

OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS i9 84

Oxford University Press, Walton Street, Oxford 0 X 2 6DP London N ew York Toronto Delhi Bombay Calcutta Madras Karachi Kuala Lum pur Singapore Hong Kong Tokyo Nairobi Dar es Salaam Cape Town Melbourne Auckland and associated companies in Beirut Berlin Ibadan Mexico City Nicosia Oxford is a trade mark o f Oxford University Press Published in the United States by Oxford University Press, New York © Bryan Ward-Perkins 1984 All rights reserved. No part o f this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, w ithout the prior permission o f Oxford University Press This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way o f trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated w ithout the publisher's prior consent in any form o f binding or cover other than that in which it is published and w ithout a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Ward-Perkins, J.B. From classical antiquity to the Middle Ages: public building in northern and central Italy AD 300-850. — (Oxford historical monographs) 1. Architecture, Medieval — Italy 2. Architecture — Italy 3. Italy — Public buildings — History I. Title 725'.0945 N A4303.A1 ISBN 0-19-821898-2

Typeset by Hope Services, Abingdon, Oxon Printed in Great Britain at the University Press, Oxford by David Stanford Printer to the University

Preface

The aim of this book is to examine one of the most dramatic physical changes in Italian urban life to occur between classical and early medieval times: the abandonment of the secular Roman monuments and the rise of a new Christian tradition of public building. Elsewhere, particularly in northern Europe but also to some extent in the Byzantine East, this change can be explained in terms of an almost complete breakdown of classical urban life at the end of antiquity, followed by a gradual resurgence of the towns over the next few centuries, in an entirely new climate, with new traditions of public building. In Italy, however, there was no such break in urban life, and throughout late antiquity and the early Middle Ages towns continued to play an important role in society, and, above all, never lost their position as the seats of the secular and ecclesiastical administrations.1 The radical changes apparent in Italian urban building must, therefore, be examined against a background of considerable urban continuity, and must be seen as a gradual transforma­ tion from one tradition of patronage to another, caused not by a complete collapse of Roman-style urban life but by slower changes in the political, social, economic, and religious history of the peninsula. The history of Italy’s buildings is not just a story of bricks and mortar, but also a mirror of vital changes in Italian society in a difficult and little-known period. The chronological range I have selected to illustrate these changes, from c.300 to c.850 (with an introductory chapter going back to the Republic and early Empire), was determined 1 I am all too well aware that this book examines one detail of urban life, though an important one, when there is still no full general survey of the history of Italian towns in the early Middle Ages. However, a good impression of urban life can be formed from the short accounts of C. Wickham, Early Medieval Italy (London, 1981), 80-92, and G. L. Bami and G. Fasoli, L ’Italia nell'alto medioevo (Turin, 1971), 198-266.

vi

Preface

by a wish to take the subject through from antiquity to an unquestionably ‘medieval’ period. It could have been ex­ panded indefinitely in either direction. That it was not, was determined mainly by reason of time, effort, and space, but also by a belief that this date-range covers a major period of change from Roman to medieval. A student of antiquity might reasonably object that I have not carried my detailed survey back to c. AD 100, in order to trace the very beginnings of the decline of civic patronage, but I frankly admit that this task was beyond me, and that my main interests lie later in history. In geographical range I have tried to cover the whole of mainland Lombard Italy, from Salerno northwards, and the whole of the Byzantine North. I would feel happier if I had included the deep south and Sicily, at least until the Arab invasions. However, time and lack of familiarity with these regions excluded any comprehensive treatment. I have, how­ ever, on occasion stepped outside both my chronological and my geographical limits. I have used only printed sources, with occasional reference to standing remains and to archaeology. For the period I have chosen, almost all the primary material is in print, and, by confining myself to this, I have been able to treat the subject with the broad chronological and geographical sweep which is essential to make sense of it. I cannot claim, however, to have read all the relevant published primary sources. In particular, I am well aware that I am less well informed about Naples and the duchies of Benevento and Spoleto than about Rome and the North. This is partly because the material for these areas is more scattered, and partly because my main interest and familiarity is with the towns of northern and central Italy. Archaeologists may wonder why I use so little information derived from excavation. The answer is simply that only in the last ten years has post-classical archaeology emerged in Italy, and therefore very little archaeological work has been done so far on aspects of public building that are relevant to this book, such as the continuity of Roman defensive works into the Middle Ages or the abandonment of traditional secular buildings. I hope that future research will fill this gap.2* 2 For a brief account of the potential for early medieval archaeology in Italy, see B. Ward-Perkins, 4La città altömedievale’, Archeologia Medievale, x (1983).

Preface

vii

It is a pleasure, as well as duty, to thank the many people who helped me in various ways. My principal debts are to Merton College, which, with a Junior Research Fellowship, allowed me the time to expand the range I was able to cover well beyond what would otherwise have been possible; to my wife, Kate, for very considerable intellectual and emotional support; and to my supervisor, Michael Wallace-Hadrill, for timely doses of criticism and encouragement. I should also like to thank the friends and colleagues who were responsible for refining, altering, and correcting many of my ideas. In particular Peregrine Horden, Judith MacClure, Robin MacPherson, Henry Mayr-Harting, and Chris Wickham; also David Andrews, Peter Brown, Tom Brown, Carl-Richard Brühl, Averii Cameron, Roger Collins, David Ganz, Peter Godman, Philip Jones, and Roger Tomlin. I should like to thank Gillian Barnard for typing the final text, Vanessa Winchester for preparing Figures 1 and 5, and Kim Frost for checking some of my translations from Latin. The Loeb Classical Library (Harvard University Press: William Heinemann Ltd.) have kindly allowed me to quote from H. B. Dewing’s trans­ lation of Procopius. Three peculiarities of presentation need to be explained. Firstly, I have cited the names of towns in both Latin and modern Italian wherever I felt this was useful. In Chapters 1-3, which deal with the late antique period, it was necessary to give the Latin name first (with the Italian one second and bracketed), since some towns disappeared in the post-Roman period and consequently do not have modern names. How­ ever, in the rest of the book I give the modern Italian name first. Secondly, I have used the bibliography at the end of the book both as a list of works most often used and as a list of abbreviations. Thirdly, I have quoted original sources in English translation in the main text, but have left them in Latin in footnotes and appendices, since these are designed for the specialist reader. 15 January 1983

Bryan Ward-Perkins

Contents

List of Figures

x

I. The Decline of Secular Munificence

1

1. The Classiceli Period 2. Late Antiquity 3. Late Antique Rome II. The Rise of Christian Patronage 4. 5. 6. 7.

Churches The End of the Temples The Buildings of Secular Entertainment Water and Water-Supply

3 14 38 49 51 85 92 119

III. The Necessities of an Urban Society and Administration

155

8. Palaces 9. Streets, Bridges, and City Walls

157 179

IV. The Unwanted Classical Buildings

201

10.

Spoliation and Reuse of Unwanted Buildings

203

Appendices 1. Late Antique Statues (outside Rome) 2. Church-Building in Rome, Ravenna, Pavia, and Lucca 3. The Aqueducts of Rome in the Early Middle Ages

230 236 250

X

Contents 4. Papal Repairs and Additions to the Lateran

256

Bibliography

258

Figures

266

Index

271

List of Figures 1. The aqueducts o f R om e in the early M iddle Ages

266

2. The façade o f T h eo d o ric’s palace, as show in the m osaics o f S. A pollinare N u ovo (Mansell C ollection)

267

3. M odem V erona from the air, show ing the grid-pattern o f streets dating from Rom an tim es (British Crown C op yrigh t/ RAF photograph)

2 68

4. The Ico n o g ra p h ia R a teria n a , co p y o f a lo st tenth-cen tu ry drawing o f V erona (B iblioteca Capitolare, V erona)

269

5. The Rom an Forum in late antiquity and the early M iddle Ages

270

PART I THE DECLINE OF SECULAR MUNIFICENCE

The three chapters that form the first part of this book attempt to set out the essential background to the whole work: the boom in public building in classical times, at the end of the Roman Republic and in the first two centuries of Empire, and its decline, beginning in the third century and continuing throughout late antiquity (which for my purposes I have taken to have begun in around 300 and to have ended in 568, with the Lombard invasion and the start of the Italian early Middle Ages). I have discussed late antique Rome in a separate chapter (3), since until the mid sixth century its buildings were cared for with an organization and respect unique in Italy. Only after about 550 can Rome be treated with the rest of the peninsula. It is beyond the scope of this work to deal satisfactorily with the period before the late third century; the wealth of epigraphic and other evidence is overwhelming. For these centuries, I can only hope to give in Chapter 1 an impres­ sionistic and imperfect view of public building. For late antiquity (Chapters 2 and 3), I have tried to be more compre­ hensive. However, even here the quantity of material available is large and every growing, and much turns on detailed analysis and dating of individual inscriptions.1 Without a doubt, important pieces of evidence will have eluded me. 1 I have been greatly helped by the works of prosopography which cover this period: PLRE I and II; Sundwall, Weströmische; Sundwall, Abhandlungen; Chastagnol, Fastes. PLRE II was published after I wrote the first draft of this work; I have tried to absorb its information, but,may have missed some details.

1

The Classical Period Most of the public buildings in Italy of the period before 300 were erected and, when necessary, repaired with privately donated money. Almost every Roman town in Italy has pro­ duced some inscriptions recording private generosity, not only in building, but also in the provision of other amenities outside our principal interest here, such as shows, feasts, and gifts of food and money.1 Towns where large numbers of inscriptions have been recovered, like Ostia, Pompeii, and Herculaneum, have produced a mass of epigraphic evidence of munificence; either from inscriptions on the buildings themselves, recording who had paid for them, or from the statue bases and funerary inscriptions that give an account of a man’s offices and worthy deeds.2 The motives behind such patronage were in detail very 1 For these: Hands, 89-115; O. Toller, De spectaculis, cenis, distributionibus in municipiis romanis occidentis imperatorum aetate exhibitis (Altenburg, 1889); S. Mrozek, ‘Les B énéficiais des distributions privées d’argent et de nourriture dans les villes italiennes à l’époque du haut-empire’, Epigraphica 34 (1972), 30-54. A large gift of this kind was a legacy of 1,000,000 sesterces to the town of Pisaurum (Pesaro): CIL xi. 6377. Out of the interest from this, yearly public banquets were to be given on the birthday of the deceased man’s son, and five-yearly gladiatorial shows. Other less spectacular examples are common: e.g. CIL v. 7637 = ILS 5065 from near Pollentia; CIL v. 2072 from Feltria; CIL v. 2090 = ILS 8371 from Acelum. For huge imperial gifts of money, food, and wine: R. Lanciani, Pagan and Christian Rom e (London, 1895), 175. 2 For a list of munificence in Italy involving endowments: B. Laum, Stiftungen in der griechischen und römischen A ntike (Leipzig-Berlin, 1914), voi. ii, pp. 163-86. For a list of gifts of specified sums of money to Italian towns: DuncanJones, E R E , 157-237 (further bibliography p. 121 n. 3). Frank, v. 95-102 col­ lected a wide range of examples of spending on public works of all sorts in Italy. For an impression of such munificence in Cisalpine Gaul: A. Lussana, ‘Osservazioni sulle testimonianze di munificenza privata della Gallia Cisalpina nelle iscrizioni latine’, Epigraphica, 12 (1950), 117-23. Patronage of this kind was not, of course, restricted to Italy: Laum, cited above;Duncan-Jones, E R E ; R. MacMullen, ‘Roman Imperial Building in the Provinces’, Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, 64 (1959), 207-35; Jones, Greek C ity; Pliny, Epistulae x, above all 23, 37-40, and 75-6.

4

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

varied, but at the root of them all was much that was com­ mon: civic pride, and, above all, a strong desire for prestige in one’s home town in life, and for commemoration there after death. All three elements appear in a letter of the Younger Pliny to Calpurnius Fabatus, his wife’s grandfather and a fellow citizen of Comum (Como), in which he praised the building of a portico in the town, dedicated by Calpurnius in his own name and in the name of his dead son (Pliny’s father-in-law). This building and dedication pleased Pliny for three reasons: it brought gloria to Calpurnius, which reflected also on Pliny as a member of the family; it commemorated his dead father-in-law with a fine building; and it beautified their beloved home town.3 In his will, Pliny himself later far outdid such generosity, with gifts to Comum of huge sums of money to decorate and run a bath-building, to maintain his own freedmen, to feed some of the poor children of the town, and to build a library and maintain it.4 Pliny is, in fact, the rarer case of a man who made a name for himself and added to his fortune at the centre of power, and then poured part of his wealth back into his home town.5 Most patronage of buildings came from rich men who did not leave home, but operated on a purely local stage, which until at least 200 could be very active and competitive. There can be no doubt that in the three centuries between 1 0 0 bc and AD 200 there was a large and very rich aristocracy in Italy 3 Pliny, Ep. V. ii. 2: ‘Gaudeo primum tua gloria, cuius ad me pars aliqua pro necessitudine nostra redundat; deinde quod memoriam soceri mei pulcherrimis operibus video proferri; postremo quod patria nostra florescit.* 4 CIL V. 5262 = IL S 2927. The inscription is partly lost and some details are uncertain. Pliny also built a monument at Hispellum (Spello, CIL xi. 5272), and a temple at Tifernum Tiberinum (Pliny, Ep. iii. 4. 2; iv. 1. 4-5; x. 8. 2-4). This latter in gratitude for being made patronus of the town: ‘ut referrem gratiam (nam vinci in amore turpissimum est), templum pecunia mea exstruxi’ (Ep. iv. 1 .4 -5 ). Pliny’s munificence, which was on a scale larger than any other non-imperial donor in Italy, is admirably discussed by Duncan-Jones, E R E , 27-32. 5 Examples of similar generosity to a home town by men who did well away from it are CIL v. 6513, a governor of Britain in post-Hadrianic times who rebuilt a bath at Novaria (Novara); CIL ix. 3152 = ILS 5676, three early second-century consuls who gave baths to Corfinium (see Duncan-Jones, E R E , 225, note on no. 443); CIL x. 1425 = IL S 5527, a proconsul of Crete and Cyrenaica who gave a basilica, gates, and part of the wall to Herculaneum; CIL xi. 1432 and 1433, a consul of the second half of the second century who gave baths to Pisa; CIL xi. 3100, a Trajanic governor of Dacia who built a cella caldana for the baths of Falerii; CIL xi. 3366, an early second-century consul who gave a bath to Tarquinii.

The Classical Period

5

that lived in towns and competed there for positions of esteem and prestige. This is most clearly reflected in the high regard and competition for local magistracies. The painted campaign posters for those of Pompeii show just how lively these elections could be, and the enormous number of funerary and other commemorative inscriptions from all over Italy, which list all the local offices held by the men commemor­ ated, show how universal was the pride felt for these.6 Local offices confirmed a man’s position in a town, but the position and the office itself first had to be bought with munificence, and one of the commonest forms this took was public building. Two inscriptions, one from Pompeii and the other from Asisium (Assisi), illustrate very explicitly this connection between munificence, social status, and local office. That from Pompeii records the rebuilding of the temple of Isis after the earthquake of 62 by a rich freedman in the name of his son, who, though only six, thereby gained a free place amongst the body of local councillors (the ordo decurionum), which in most towns had a membership of between eighty and 100 men.7 In two generations a family rose from slavery to membership of the ordo, and in the process Pompeii gained a new temple. In the inscription from Asisium a local doctor, also a freedman, proudly recorded how much he paid for his liberty, how much he paid the city in order to become an augustalis (a select honorary priest­ hood, principally for freedmen, who were debarred from the ordo itself), and how much he paid for statues in the temple of Hercules and for paving the streets of the town.8 His 6 In Pompeii in 79, ten candidates seem to have been standing for four magis­ tracies: P. Willems, Les Elections municipales à Pompéi (Brussels, 1886), 9 and 111-12. See also Macrobius, Sat. 2. 3: ‘Romae si vis habebit: Pompeiis difficile est*, a comment of Cicero on the comparative ease of obtaining entry to the Roman Senate. 7 CIL X. 846 = IL S 6367 (illustrated Pomp evi A.D. 79, no. 15). The inscription is worded as though the gift came from the six-year-old himself. His father, Numerius senior, was, as a former slave, debarred from entry to the ordo. ‘N(umerius) Popidius N(umerii) f(ilius) Celsinus, aedem Isidis terrae motu conlapsam a fundamento p(ecunia) s(ua) restituit. Hunc decuriones ob liberalitatem, cum esset annorum sexs, ordinis suo gratis adlegerunt.* 8 CIL xi. 5400 = ILS 7812: ‘P(ublius) Decimus P(ubli) l(ibertus) Eros Merula, medicus clinicus, chirurgus, ocularius; VI vir [= sevir augustalis]. Hic pro libertate dedit HS [= sesterces] (50,000). Hic pro seviratu in rem p(ublicam) dedit HS (2,000). Hic in statuas ponendas in aedem Herculis dedit HS (30,000). Hic in vias

6

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

statues and paving will certainly all have also been recorded on the spot in a series of separate inscriptions, and indeed one of those, recording his paving, survives.9 Thus he had ensured both prestige in life and commemoration after death. Not only was munificence expected of the social climbers; it was also expected of the established aristocracy, and of the emperor himself. Some of this generosity was formalized and connected with the holding of the civic office. In the consti­ tution of each town was included compulsory expenditure on games by the four annually elected chief magistrates, the duoviri and aediles, or quattuorviri. 10 This could, in at least a number of towns, be commuted into expenditure on buildings: hence a substantial number of inscriptions in Italy recording building by magistrates ‘instead of games’ (pro ludis), and ‘in return for the honour’ (ob honorem or honoris causa).11 Magistrates also feature very prominently amongst the hundreds of inscriptions that record private generosity, but do not explicitly state the motivation for it, and in some of these cases they may also have been building to fulfil a legal obligation. Ordinary members of the council, the decurions, paid money to the town on entry into the ordo, though a munifi­ cent gift, such as a new building, might gain them the pres­ tigious right of free access.12 The augustales and other sternendas in publicum dedit HS (37,000). Hic pridie quam mortuus est reliquit patrimoni HS [. . .’. 9 CIL xi. 5399 = ILS 5369: T(ublius) Decimus P(ublii) l(ibertus) Eros Merula VI vir, viam a cisterna ad domum L(ucii) Muti stravit ea pecunia [ . . . ’. 10 For the magistracies of Pompeii: Pompeii A.D. 79> 3 8 -4 1 . For those of Ostia: Meiggs, 172-85. 11 Duncan-Jones, E R E , 149. The surviving constitution of the Sullan colony of Tarentum (Taranto, IL S 6086, clauses 36-7) decreed that magistrates should spend either on games or on buildings. That of Caesar’s colony of Urso in Spain (ILS 6087, clauses 70-1) mentions only games. From Pompeii there is an un­ usually detailed inscription (CIL x. 829 = ILS 5706) which records building by magistrates ‘ex ea pecunia quod [stc] eos [«c] e lege in ludos aut in monumento consumere oportuit’, as well as inscriptions recording building ‘pro ludis’ (CIL x. 853-7 = ILS 5653 a-d; CIL x. 845). Here presumably the constitution was like that of Tarentum. Other examples of building pro ludis: CIL ix. 1643 = ILS 5734a Beneventum; CIL ix. 2235 = IL S 5328 Telesia; CIL xi. 5276 = IL S 5377 and CIL xi. 5277 Hispellum (Spello). Examples of spending ob honorem or honoris causa: CIL v. 4097 Cremona; CIL x. 852 = ILS 5627 Pompeii. 12 For statutory payments to the public treasury (summae honorariae) by incoming decurions and magistrates: Duncan-Jones, E R E , 148-54. An inscrip­

The Classical Period

7

honorary priests also had to spend for their privileges.13 In the case of appointments to magistracies, some of these costs were offset by gaining the strings of patronage, though the amount of money and power that passed through local govern­ ment was paltry compared with that controlled by the imperial civil and military services. However, what magistrates, decurions, and augustales were mainly buying was status. In the compulsory contributions of office holders we see classical Roman munificence at its most formalized, but the pressure to be generous fell on the whole aristocracy of a town, and not just in legal form on the incumbent magistrates, or on the decurions and augustales on entering office. Public spending by a rich man displayed the virtue of magnanimitas, and, on a more mundane level, it both showed off wealth and bought status. It was expected of the important and rich aristocrat, and for the less established was a step towards a secure place in society.14 Plutarch in his Moralia advised the rich to be generous in public gifts, as was expected of them, but felt it necessary to warn the poorer man not to stretch his purse too far in emulation *. . . if he is poor, he must not produce foot-races, theatrical shows, and banquets in com­ petition with the rich for reputation and power’. 15 In addition to the pressure of competition with one’s fellow aristocrats, there was encouragement to spend from the plebs below, and occasionally from the emperor above.16 Consequently, tion from Pompeii (CIL x. 1074 = ILS 5053) seems to show that a man who held the chief magistracy three times paid for games on all three occasions, and on the first one only also paid 20,000 sesterces ‘in publicum pro duomviratu’. For free access to the ordo : p. 5 n. 7 above. 13 For summae honorariae paid by augustales: p. 5-6 n. 8 above;Duncan-Jones, E R E , 152-3; Meiggs, 218. These could apparently be commuted into building: CIL xi. 6126-8, augustales of Forum Sempronii paving ‘ob honorem’; CIL xi. 3083 = IL S 5373, augustales of Falerii paving, surprisingly, ‘pro ludis’;Not. Scavi (1921), 70, augustalis from near Casamari repairing a bridge ‘ob honorem’. Under Septimius Severus and Caracalla the baths of Lanuvium were restored with the summae honorariae of the town’s priests: CIL xiv. 2101 = ILS 5686. 14 R. MacMullen, Roman Social Relations 50 B.C. to A.D. 284 (Yale, 1974), 61-2 and 107-9. For the huge gifts expected of an aristocrat at an event such as the wedding of a daughter: Apuleius, Apologia, 88. For spending by the less established: p. 5-6 nn. 7 and 8 above. 15 Plutarch, Moraliay 822. 16 For entertainments given ‘postulante populo’ (or a similar phrase): W. Liebenam, Stadtverwaltung im römischen Kaiserreiche (Leipzig, 1900), 248 n. 1. For an extreme case of populär pressure: Suetonius, Tiberiusy 37, the citizens of Pollentia extorted by threats the cost of a gladiatorial show from a dead man’s

8

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

privately financed munificence was provided by a far wider range of people than just the magistrates of a town, and even these latter often spent far more than they were obliged to by law.17 Social pressures, not written constitutions, set the pace for public building. To reward such munificence a complicated and hierarchic system of honouring benefactors and worthies was evolved. In Pompeii, Marcus Holconius Rufus, who largely rebuilt the theatre, was honoured in it with a bisellium (a reserved throne amongst the best seats) and with statues there and elsewhere in the town, twice held the most prestigious magistracy, also held the most prestigious priesthood (as sacerdos Augusti), and was appointed patronus of the colony, a title given to very important men who had benefited, or who could benefit, a town in a variety of ways, which might include public building.18 A man who gave the town of Suessa a free gladi­ atorial show was granted by the decurions a public statue, a bisellium, free water from the aqueduct, and free access to the rank of decurion for himself and his son.19 A first-century augustalis from Veii recorded the privileges his new position gave him: the right to a bisellium at shows, the right to sit heirs. For the emperor Nerva’s encouragement of public spending: Pliny, Ep. x. 8. 1: ‘. . . omnes cives ad munificentiam esset cohortatus,. . . ’. 17 For examples of people who cannot have been spending because of holding local office: p. 4 n. 5 above, and for cases of women financing building: CIL ix. 3677 = ILS 5684 Marsi Marruvium, a female bath; CIL x. 3922 = ILS 5708 Capua, part o f a bath; CIL x. 5183 = IL S 5628 Casinum (Cassino), an amphitheatre and temple; CIL xi. 1189= IL S 5560 Veleia, a portico. 18 For patroni and the benefits they brought to towns: Harmand, 354-85; Hands, 51. For Holconius Rufus: CIL x. 830 = ILS 6361b; CIL x. 833-5 = ILS 5638; CIL x. 837-40 = ILS 6361, 6361a, and 6362; CIL x. 948 ; Guida di Pompei, 147. Compare CIL xi. 4815 = IL S 6638: a certain Torasius who gave buildings and banquets to Spoletium (Spoleto) and held various civic posts, ‘hunc ob merita eius erga rem publicam ordo decurionum patronum municipi adoptavit’. Pliny, on being co-opted patronus of Tifernum Tiberinum, gave the town a temple: see p. 4 n. 4 above. 19 CIL x. 4760 = IL S 6296. For the b iseüium : PW, ‘Bisellium’, and CIL x. 1026 = ILS 6372 for the tomb of an augustalis o f Pompeii, who proudly had a carved bisellium represented on his tomb with the following inscription: ‘C(aio) Calventio Quieto augustali: huic ob munificent(iam) decurionum decreto et populi conse(n)su bisellii honor datus est.’ For Italian inscriptions recording payments of large sums ‘ob honorem bisellii’: CIL xi. 1441 = ILS 6599 Pisae (Pisa), 50,000 sesterces; CIL xiv. 374 = IL S 6165 Ostia, 50,000 sesterces; CIL xiv. 431 Ostia, 50,000 sesterces\Anru Ep. (1927), no. 124 Formiae, 25,000 sesterces.

The Classical Period

9

with the decurions at all public banquets, and exemption from any civic taxes (a privilege that carried only slight financial advantages).20 Benefactors were frequently given public funerals and a free site for their tombs, and had statues erected to them in the town by a grateful ordo and people.21 In the first two centuries ad the fora and other public places were crowded with a host of such statues, and almost certainly distinctions of material, character, and placing of these were considered very important in differentiating the precise merits and status of the commemorated man: a marble statue on foot in a remote corner of the town was obviously much inferior to a gilt bronze equestrian statue in the forum. At Petelia in Southern Italy, a man left a large legacy to provide annual gifts of money to various groups of townspeople, but only ‘if the citizens erect in my honour a statue on foot in the upper forum, with a stone plinth and marble base, like the base which the augustales erected to me near the statue put up in my honour by the townsmen’.22 Often these grants of statues allowed for a public display of mutual congratulation: the ordo decrees a statue to a worthy, he ‘pleased by the honour’ [honore contentus), pays for it himself, and then gives large gifts of food or money at its dedication to the ordo and to various groups of citizens, or even to the whole town.23 î0 CIL xi. 3805 = IL S 6579. 21 Public funerals and free sites for tombs: e.g. CIL v. 2852 Patavium (Padova); CIL xi. 1600 Florentia (Florence); CIL xi. 3375 and 3379 Tarquinii (Tarquinia); Guida di Pompei, 281 and 329-30. Statues: Marcus Nonius Balbus, a great bene­ factor of Herculaneum, had at least three statues erected to him there by the citizens (CIL x. 1426 = ILS 896; CIL x. 1427-8), one by the people of Nuceria (Nocera) (CIL x. 1429 = ILS 896a), and five by various subjects of his province of Cyrenaica and Crete (CIL x. 1430-4). 22 For the statue-bases of. the forum of Pompeii: Guida di Pompei, 103-7; CIL x. 788-92. Funerary inscriptions that record the granting of a public statue are sometimes careful to describe it, if it was a particularly prestigious one, e.g. CIL v. 4192 Brixia (Brescia), ‘statuam equestrem auratam’; CIL x. 1024 = ILS 6366 Pompeii, ‘statuam equestr(em) [in f] oro’. Both these m^n also received public funerals. For the inscription from Petelia: ILS 6468; Hands, 50 and 189 D.31. 23 For an example of payment for one’s own statue and largesse at its dedica­ tion: CIL xi. 6123 Forum Sempronii. For a good group of examples of largesse at dedication: CIL xi. 6358 = ILS 6654; CIL xi. 6360; CIL xi. 6362 = ILS 7364; CIL xi. 6371 and 6378, all from Pisaurum (Pesaro).

10

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

The provision of banquets, gifts of food and money, or shows perhaps bought most immediate popularity, and, by an endowment providing income, these could in theory even be provided yearly in perpetuity after death; but a building with its inscription could be a more lasting memorial, less likely to disappear than an endowment, and seen every day of the year by the citizenry.24 Certainly, one of the attrac­ tions of building was for its value as a lasting monument; hence the legacies for building made by many in their wills, and hence the practice of dedicating buildings, not only in one’s own name, but also in that of a deceased relative.25 The greater part of building was privately financed, but there are also many inscriptions recording building and repair with public money by the town administration, a second category of patronage, which I shall term ‘civic’. This was particularly common with the building of town walls, but it also appears with other buildings.26 Thus at Pompeii, though the amphitheatre and large theatre, and at least part of the Stabian baths, were privately financed (mainly by magistrates), the small theatre and a part of the Forum baths were paid for from civic funds.27 At Venafrum the building of the amphi­ theatre was perhaps half private and half civic.28 Satisfactory 24 For the appeal of shows and distributions: Hands, 24-5. For legal texts of the first half of the third century intended to ensure that a benefactor got, and kept for ever, due credit for building in the inscriptions that record it: Justinian, Digest y L 10. 2 and 7. 25 For benefactions as a means of commemoration after death: Hands, 56-8. Legacies: e.g. Pliny the Younger (see p. 4 n. 4 above), and CIL xi. 5939 = ILS 5678, a legacy of 150,000 sesterces for baths at Tifemum Tiberinum. Building in another’s name: e.g. Pliny’s wife’s grandfather (see p. 4 n. 3 above), and CIL x. 5411 = ILS 5780, a patronus (perhaps of Interamna Lirenas) builds an aqueduct ‘matris nomine’. That this could be a very effective commemoration is shown by the name ‘thermae Turasi* of baths of Spoletium (Spoleto) in Ostrogothic times (Variae iv. 24). ‘Turasi’ must refer to the donor—almost certainly a. patronus of the town some three centuries earlier (CIL xi. 4815 = ILS 6638). 26 Civic building or repair to town walls: CIL ix. 3354 = IL S 5327 Pinna; CIL ix. 3885 = IL S 4024 Lucus; CIL x. 5682 = ILS 5593 Arpinum; CIL x. 5806 Aletrium; CIL x. 5837-40 = IL S 5342-5 Ferentinum; CIL x. 6105 = IL S 5329 Formiae (Formia); CIL x. 6238-9 = ILS 5323-4 Fundi (Fondi); CIL xi. 402 Ariminum (Rimini);C IL xi. 4809 Spoletium (Spoleto). 27 Amphitheatre: CIL x. 852-7 = IL S 5627 and 5653a-e. Large theatre: CIL x. 833-4 = IL S 5638. Stabian baths: CIL x. 829 = ILS 5706. Small theatre: CIL x. 844 = IL S 5636. Forum baths: CIL x. 817 = ILS 5726. 28 Venafrum: CIL x. 4892 and 4894; both inscriptions are fragmentary and

The Classical Period

11

evidence on the income of towns in Italy is lacking, but this must have derived from a variety of sources, above all from civic lands and from a certain amount of local taxation and fines.29 However, it is probable that these sources never brought in a huge amount, and that for a town’s budget to be healthy enough to permit large projects it depended heavily on the more or less willing contributions of the aristocracy: the summae honorariae paid to the public treasury on entering office by augustales, decurions, and magistrates, and the occasional windfalls in the form of legacies.30 Consequently, even civic building projects were in part dependent on the same spirit of social competition and voluntary munificence by the aristocracy as produced the privately financed buildings. A third category of patronage was that provided by the central administration, for most of our period the emperor. Town walls were a favoured area of investment, for obvious military reasons, but occasionally other more luxurious projects were imperially financed: for instance, Augustus built baths at Bononia (Bologna), Augustus and Tiberius built the aqueduct of Brixia (Brescia), Trajan built the aqueduct of Ravenna, and Hadrian and Antonius Pius built baths at Ostia.31 In most areas of Italy imperial money provided only very occasional buildings, but in Rome itself, the capital and imperial residence, the Senate, then the dictators, and finally the emperors, poured out huge sums of so hard to interpret with certainty. Pliny seems to describe a similar arrangement for the theatre of Nicaea in Bithynia: Ep. x. 3 9 -4 0 . 29 Meiggs, 176-7. Huge fines were laid down for the violation of mausolea, but are unlikely to have been exacted very often. An Oscan inscription from Pompeii records the building of a suridial in the Stabian baths with money raised from fines: Guida di Pompei, 297. 30 Summae honorariae: see pp. 6-7 nn. 12 and 13 above. Legacies: a list of seven of these to Italian towns, with specified sums of money (from 15,200 to 400,000 sesterces), appears in Duncan-Jones, E R E , 217 nos. 1328-34. 31 Town walls: CIL v. 525 = IL S 77 Tergeste (Trieste); CIL v. 6358 Laus Pompeia (Lodi Vecchio); CIL ix. 2443 = ILS 147 Saepinum: CIL xi. 5 Ravenna; CIL xi. 6218-19 = IL S 104 Fanum Fortunae (Fano). Other projects: CIL xi. 720 = IL S 5674 Bononia,baths;CIL v. 4307 = IL S 114 Brixia,aqueduct; Anon. Vales., c. 71 (p. 324) Ravenna, aqueduct (a sixth-century source, admittedly); CIL xiv. 98 = ILS 334 Ostia, baths. Imperial patronage was certainly a mark of favour: Pompeii, in disgrace after a riot in 59, was not helped by imperial funds after the disastrous earthquake of 62.

12

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

money into the grandiose buildings which will be familiar to everyone.32 By the end of the first century ad even the smallest town was endowed with a more or less standard collection of monumental public buildings: town walls, paved streets, aqueduct, baths, drains, temples, amphitheatre, theatre, forum square, basilica, curia, porticoes, and a population of statues.33 Once built, it was necessary to provide day-to-day mainten­ ance for these buildings, and occasionally to carry out radical repairs and even complete rebuilding. Occasionally buildings were damaged by exceptional circumstances: earthquake, or fire, a hazard that the heated bath-buildings were perhaps particularly prone to.34 But the main enemy was decay brought on by age. However good day-to-day maintenance might have been, every building would have required occa­ sional major structural repairs, which might amount to almost complete rebuilding, and some of the more fragile buildings, such as the aqueducts, certainly needed frequent large-scale work.35 Italy has provided a large number of inscriptions 32 Amongst the most impressive projects were the imperial fora (of Julius Caesar, Augustus, Nerva, Vespasian, and Trajan), the baths (of Agrippa, Nero, Titus, Trajan, Caracalla, Decius, and Diocletian), and the Flavian amphitheatre, or Colosseum. For an idea of the sums of money involved: Platner-Asby, 225-6 on Caesar’s forum. 33 For a good example of a small Italian town with many of these amenities excavated and visible, impressive though on a small scale: M. Marini Calvani, Veleia (Parma, 1975). The donors of three buildings are known: the forum square was paved by a magistrate, perhaps instead of paying a summa honoraria (CIL xi. 1184), the basilica built by a patronus (CIL xi. 1185), and a portico by a rich woman (CIL xi. 1189 = IL S 5560). 34 Pompeii was very badly damaged by an earthquake in 62. Examples of repair to bath-buüdings damaged by fire (‘vi ignis consumptas’ (or a similar phrase): prob­ ably CIL V . 6513 Novaria (Novara); CIL xi. 6225 = ILS 5679 Fanum Fortunae (Fano); CIL xiv. 376 Ostia. For fourth- and fifth-century examples see p. 34 n. 59 below. 35 Examples of repair to aqueducts Vetustate conlapsum’ (or a similar phrase): CIL ix. 3018 = ILS 5761 Teate Marrucinorum (Chieti); CIL ix. 3308 = ILS 5760 Corfinium; CIL ix. 4130 = IL S 5775 Aequicoli; CIL ix. 5681 Cingulum; CIL x. 4860 Venafrum; CIL x. 6526 = ILS 5772 Cora; CIL xi. 4582 Carsulae. In Rome the Aqua Claudia, completed in 52/53 by Claudius, needed a major repair by Vespasian in 71 after already being out of action for nine years (if we believe the inscription), and a further major repair in 80/1 by Titus: CIL vi. 1256, 1257, and 1258 = /LS 218; Ashby, 191-2; Van Deman, 187.

The Classical Period

13

from all centuries of Roman rule to record such major repairs, and, if the cause is specified, it is generally said to be that the building is ‘collapsed through age’ (vetustate conlapsum), ‘long neglected’ {longa incuria neglectum), or some similar phrase.36 Only very rarely were buildings endowed by their donors to ensure maintenance and repair. Though Pliny handsomely endowed his bath-building and library at Comum, and a man who built a portico at Pitinum Mergens left 4,000 sesterces ‘[from the interest of which] this building should be repaired if ever [it is necessary] ’, these seem to have been exceptional cases.37 In general, responsibility for the buildings fell without endowment on the town. Day-to-day maintenance was paid for from civic funds and perhaps done by civic slaves, but even in the rosiest days of the Empire major repair seems normally to have been beyond the towns’ finances, and to have depended on the same spirit of private generosity as produced new buildings, with occasional help from the central administration.38 36 Examples of repairs to bath-buildings specified to be damaged by age: CIL 5917 = ILS 1909 Anagnia (Anagni); CIL xi. 3363 Tarquinii (Tarquinia); CIL xi. 6040 Pitinum Pisaurense; CIL xiv. 2101 = ILS 5686 Lanuvium. 37 Pliny: CIL v. 5262 = ILS 2927, 200,000 sesterces ‘in tutelam’ of the bath­ building and 100,000 of the library. Pitinum Mergens: CIL xi. 5963. For other endowments ‘in tutelam* of buildings and statues: Duncan-Jones, E R E , 206-7 nos. 1143a-l 160. At Altinum a man who repaired the bath-building in the second century left an endowment for heating, maintenance, and a yearly feast: Hands, 208 D.77 = Not. Scavi (1928), 283. 38 Cases of privately financed repair to bath-buildings datable with reasonable certainty to before 300 are: CIL v. 6513 Novaria (Novara); CIL ix. 4978 = ILS 5670 Cures, with both civic money and that contributed by two augustales; CIL X . 3922 = IL S 5708 Capua; CIL x. 5200 Casinum (Cassino); CIL x. 5348 = ILS 5698 Interamna Lirenas (sometimes associated with another inscription of 408, CIL x. 5349, but very possibly much earlier); CIL x. 5917 = ILS 1909 Anagnia (Anagni); CIL xi. 4094 Ocriculum; CIL xi. 6040 Pitinum Pisaurense; CIL xi. 6225 = ILS 5679 Fanum Fortunae (Fano), recording both civic and private repairs; CIL xiv. 2119 Lanuvium. Cases of civic repair are: CIL ix. 2660 Saepinum; CIL ix. 3430 = ILS 5668/9 Peltuinum; CIL ix. 4978 = IL S 5670 Cures, with both civic and augustales’ money; CIL ix. 5067 = IL S 5666 Interamnia Praetuttiorum; CIL ix. 6193 Aceruntia; CIL ix. 6261 Aquilonia; CIL xi. 6225 = ILS 5679 Fanum Fortunae (Fano), recording both civic and private repairs; CIL xiv. 2101 Lanuvium, with priests’ summae honorariae; CIL xiv. 3013 = IL S 5667 Praeneste (Palestrina). A case of imperial repair (before the fourth century): CIL xi. 3363 Tarquinii, by Antoninus Pius. Already in the second century a law of Antoninus Pius attempted to encourage repair rather than unnecessary new building (see Chapter 2 below for such legislation in late antiquity). X.

2

Late Antiquity By about 300 a dramatic change had taken place. Private munificence of the classical type had virtually disappeared, and civic initiative had declined with it. The only patronage to flourish was that of the emperor himself, and that of the new imperial governors of the provinces of Italy, established in the late third century. The result was a general decline in the amount of new building and repair carried out, and a complete change in the pattern of patronage. Exactly when private patronage declined probably varied from town to town. The general picture seems to be of continued munifi­ cence until the end of the second century, and of marked decline in the early third century.1 The reasons for this are complex and hard to pin down with precision, but at least some of the contributing factors can be seen. Firstly, it is clear that, though wealth certainly never disappeared in Roman Italy, the general economic position of the peninsula was in decline from the first century onwards, so that at least a reduction in the quantity of munificence might be expected. By the third century Italy was no longer receiving the vast booty of the wars of expansion, but paying for the wars of defence, and,' far from growing rich on export­ ing her agricultural and manufactured goods to the provinces, was enriching them by her imports.2 Secondly, and closely affected by this economic decline, the potentially dramatic social and economic mobility of the 1 Duncan-Jones, ERE, 350-7 appendix 11 analyses dated inscriptions record­ ing munificence from Italy and shows a great decline in number after the end of the second century. This is borne out by those inscriptions datable only approxi­ mately (by references to datable people and offices and by epigraphic details): Duncan-Jones, E R E , 157-223. At Ostia privately financed building had certainly ceased by 300. 2 Frank, v. 296-304; M. Rostovtzeff, The Social and Economic History o f the Roman Empire, 2nd edn. (Oxford, 1957), 192-206.

Late A ntiquity

15

first two centuries of Empire was greatly reduced. As we have seen, in the first century freedmen could rise to great wealth through trade or the professions, and buy respectability and local office with their munificence. In the fourth century such parvenus can rarely be found, except in the imperial service. Wealth, particularly in Italy, seems to have fallen into the hands of a comparatively small number of aristocratic clans.3 Consequently, towns no longer benefited from the status-buying of the new men, and the established aristocracy no longer felt under such intense pressure publicly to display and confirm their positions of superiority. But much more important than either of these two factors was the increasing realization that local prestige and office was more of a burden than an honour, and that real power and real status could be derived only from the holding of imperial posts and imperial honours. Even in their period of greatest flourishing the civic ideals that led men to lavish buildings and other gifts on their home towns were outdated: they belonged more naturally to an age of city-republics, where local patriotism reflected a struggle for survival, and the quest for local office and status was fierce because there was nothing higher to aim for. In Italy the emperor always gathered the lion’s share of taxation and power, and even the highest civic magistrates always lacked important jurisdictional rights, such as that of imposing the death sentence.4 By 300, changes had taken place that worsened the situa­ tion and effectively destroyed any fragile belief that the local stage was a worthy place for a man to perform. The cities were brought under increasingly tight imperial control. Under Trajan appears the curator rei publicae, an imperial official to supervise municipal finance and spending. Although the post normally went to a local man and was absorbed as a new, 3 Rostovtzeff (cited in previous note); Brown, 40; Matthews, 1-31. For evi­ dence of some continuing social mobility see the arguments and further references in R. MacMullen, ‘Social Mobility and the Theodosian Code’, Journal o f Roman Studies, 54 (1964), 49-53. 4 Meiggs, 174; P. Brown, The Making o f Late A ntiquity (Harvard, 1978), 28-53. For evidence that it became necessary in some cities of the Empire to make office-holding and civic spending compulsory as early as the second century: P. Garnsey, ‘Aspects of the Decline of the Urban Aristocracy in the Empire*, Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt> ii. 1, pp. 229-52.

16

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

higher rung of a civic cursus honorum, unlike the other magistrates he owed his position to the emperor, as well as to his standing in the town, and was not obliged by law to spend on it.5 The curator became effectively the new chief magis­ trate of a town, and in the second century he frequently appears supervising civic building.6 He still occasionally appears in this role in the late third and fourth centuries: for instance, the curator of Comum (Como) supervised the building of a temple by the provincial governor in 286/93; the curator of Beneventum (Benevento) moved a statue to a bath-building, possibly in the late third or early fourth century; the curator of Aesernia (Isernia) supervised the erection of a statue by the ordo to a provincial governor in 352/7; the curator of Saepinum erected a statue to the Genium Curiae of the town in 375; the curator of Pisaurum (Pesaro) supervised the repair of a bridge by Gratian and Valentinian. Even in Ostrogothic times a curator appears, re-erecting a statue at Faventia (Faenza), though this man possibly also held the governorship of the town.7 In the late third century this first step was taken much further, when Italy was divided into provinces with imperially appointed governors, who assumed complete control of the areas they ruled. By this date in most Italian towns they perhaps stepped into what was already a vacuum of power, rather than elbowed out a local aristocracy clamouring for civic office; but they undoubtedly destroyed what little s PW, ‘Curatores’; Jones, L R E , 726. Duncan-Jones,/ta/y, 206-7 rightly points out that the creation of curatores rei publicae did not at once kill private munifi­ cence, which flourished in Italy in the second century. 6 Examples of curatores taking responsibility for public building: CIL x. 1814 (dated 161) and 1791 (dated 181), both Puteoli (Pozzuoli), a curator assigns the places for public statues; CIL x. 4860 Venafrum, the people of Interamna Lirenas erect a statue to their curator, who had been responsible for restoring their aqueduct. 7 Comum: A nn. Ep. (1919), no. 52 (for the date PLRE I, Titianus 9). Bene­ ventum: CIL ix. 1588 = IL S 5480 (PLRE I, Crescens 4). Aesernia: CIL ix. 2639 = IL S 1248 (PLRE I, Maximus 35). Saepinum: CIL xi. 5996 = ILS 5519. Pisaurum: CIL xi. 6328. Faventia: CIL xi. 268 = Fiebiger-Schmidt, no. 182 (see p. 28 n. 41 below). All these works are very minor. In Capua a statue was set up to a curator, who was also patronus of the town, describing him as ‘institutori novorum ac renovatori operum publicorum’: CIL x. 3857 = IL S 5509. This inscription may be fourth-century, and either refers to privately financed work or possibly to work carried out on behalf of the town by our man in his role as curator (PLRE I, Leonidas).

Late A ntiquity

17

concept of civic autonomy might remain, and removed any chance of there ever being a resurgence of civic pride. In the late fourth century a further check on local government was imposed with the institution of the defensor civitatis chosen from outside the ordo.z Parallel with this devaluation of the rewards of traditional civic office came a sense that its burdens were very great, and no longer worth supporting.89 Besides the games paid for by the magistrates, and the summae honorariae paid by decurions, these latter were also responsible for the unpleasant burden of raising and, if necessary, underwriting imperial taxation, and this became an ever more difficult task as the needs for it increased and the ability to pay for it in many areas decreased. Consequently, the fourth century is full of stories of the hard lot of the decurions, and of legislation trying to prevent them avoiding it.10 It may well be the case that some of their com­ plaints were exaggerated; for our purposes we only need to know that they felt aggrieved, and therefore would try and avoid traditional local pre-eminence, which centred on mem­ bership of the ordo, rather than pour out money to buy it. The new élite were not the local civic officials, but the privileged imperial servants, who gained not only real power and wealth from their positions, but also immunity from the whole range of duties that might bear down on a decurion.11 Their status had nothing to do with local office and local munificence and, though it is certain that many of them did build on a grand scale to enhance their standing, they no longer produced the traditional buildings of public munifi­ cence, but more private ones: large town houses, villas, and churches.12 Though they might wish to impress their home town, they had little need to court it. 8 For the defensores: Jones, L R E , 144-5. 9 Hands, 37. 10 Jones, L R E , 737-57. For some of the many stories of reluctant and unfor­ tunate decurions: Amm. Marc. xxii. 9. 8 and 12; xxv. 4. 21;xxvii. 7. 7; Libanius passim in his speeches (e.g. Oratio ii). 11 Jones, L R E , 535-6. For Antioch, where there is the detailed fourth-century evidence of Libanius: Liebeschuetz, 50-1 and 174-92. 12 For churches see Chapter 4. For splendid late antique town houses at Ostia: Meiggs, 258-62; G. Becatti, Case ostiensi del tardo impero (Rome, 1948). For the sumptuous building and life-style of the late fourth-century aristocracy of the capital Milan, attacked by Ambrose: Ruggini, 8 4 -9 3 . For two of the private build­ ings of the late antique aristocracy of Rome: Platner-Ashby, 182 and 196. For

18

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

The third and fourth centuries also saw increasing insecur­ ity, and the rise of a new religion. The effects of the former on munificence were probably considerable. The extreme crisis of the third century may have temporarily diverted all effort into works of defence, and imperial building through­ out late antiquity was often concentrated on town walls. For example, under the temporary respite of the tetrarchy, Diocletian and Maximian issued a law attempting to get funds, which had been diverted into building city walls during the problems of the third century, redirected to their original ends—the provision of games in the towns.13 Similarly, Ammianus Marcellinus records how, during an emergency in 374, building materials assembled at Sirmium for a new theatre were used instead in fortification work.14 Further­ more, as a look later in this Chapter at the Visigothic invasions will show, military disaster from the third century onwards could be devastating to the atmosphere needed for traditional munificence to flourish. Even though the military, political, and monetary problems of the third century did not ruin the fortunes of every aristocrat, they must none the less have severely dented the self-confidence and magnanimitas of the private spenders.15 I shall examine in detail the effects of Christianity in later chapters (4-7). As well as ending all patronage of temples, it certainly eventually provided new channels of public spending for the rich, and thereby perhaps helped deal the final death-blow to traditional munificence; but the evidence from Italy suggests that, in most areas, the old munificence was already almost dead in the late third and Symmachus’s interest in house- and villa-building: McGeachy, 114-15. A rich late antique house has recently been discovered in the small provincial town of Luna (Luni), with a late circus-mosaic. In the east, at Antioch, rich late houses are well documented both archaeologically and in the writings of Libanius: D. Levi, Antioch Mosaic Pavements (Princeton, 1947); e.g. Libanius, Oratio ii. 54-5: ‘Others [= governors’ lackeys], just by the size of their houses, are a nuisance to their neighbours, for they do not allow them the enjoyment of full clear daylight.’ The most famous example of a late antique country villa is that of Piazza Armerina in Sicily, though it is impossible to prove beyond doubt that this was a private, and not an imperial, building. 13 Justinian, Codex, xi. 42. 1. See also Chapter 6. 14 Amm. Marc. xxix. 6. 11. 15 For a view of the third-century anarchy as responsible for destroying civic government: Rostovtzeff, op. cit. (p. 14 n. 2 above), 513-14.

Late Antiquity

19

fourth centuries, which makes it impossible to attribute its decline in any substantial way to the new religion. The principal effect on public building of these various changes was to destroy almost all private patronage, both that by magistrates, as a more or less compulsory part of their duties, and that by private individuals. The creation of the imperial civic magistracies, which carried no duties to spend, combined with the power of the provincial governors and the realization that local office was not worth the sacrifices it involved, caused a dramatic decline in the popularity and status of the older ‘spending’ magis­ tracies. These seem to have survived, in at least parts of Italy, until as late as the early seventh century, but are very rarely mentioned after 300, and much of their role as governors of a town was filled by the imperial officials and by the new principales curiae, an inner group of rich councillors.16 With the decline of competition for these older magistracies seems to have disappeared any obligation they had to spend on the town; certainly, record of spending by local magistrates in the fourth and fifth centuries is exceedingly rare, and I have failed to find any reference at all to spending that is either stated to be, or even seems to be, carried out as a duty of office. The augustales, who had also spent more or less will­ ingly on the town, disappeared completely in the third century. The decurions, because of their important role in imperial taxation, were forced to survive, but, as with the chief civic magistracies, there is no evidence that they any longer wished to, or had to, spend other than for the good of the central government. As well as all spending by magistrates, almost all spending 16 For the survival of the old magistracies as late as the seventh century in Byzantine areas of Italy: Jones, L R E , 761. Examples of references to fourthcentury duoviri and other officials are: CIL x. 476 = ILS 6112 and CIL x. 477, both Paestum, dated 337 and 347; CIL x. 4559 Trebula, probably late fourth century; CIL xi. 5283 = ILS 6623 Hispellum (Spello) of shortly after 333/7. Occasionally inscriptions refer to men ‘omnibus honoribus functi*: e.g. CIL xi. 4095 = ILS 5696 Ocriculum, dated 341; CIL x. 5349 Interamna Lirenas, dated 408. For the principales curiae: Jones, LRE 731; and for Italian references to them: CIL x. 6565 = IL S 5632 Velitrae (Velletri) of 364/7; CIL xi. 5283 = ILS 6623 Hispellum (Spello), also referring to the older magistracies. Ostia, with its very large collection of inscriptions of all dates, and of references to early imperial magistrates, has produced no record of fourth-century local magistrates: Meiggs, 95.

20

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

on public buildings (other than churches) by private individ­ uals disappeared. However, there are a few cases recorded of private spending, above all by patroni, and above all in the provinces of Campania and Samnium, until as late as the early fifth century.17 Campania and western Samnium were full of the estates of the senatorial aristocracy of Rome, and it was certainly the influence of this highly conservative body that kept alive in these areas a tradition of munificence that was allowed to die much earlier in the rest of Italy. The aqueducts of Amiternum (along with its bath-building) and of Sena (Siena) were restored at the expense of patroni of the towns in about 325 and in 394, respectively. The baths of Saepinum were restored with the money of a patronus in 352/7, those of Ocriculum (Otricoli) by two local magistrates in about 341, those of Interamna Lirenas by a patronus in about 408, and possibly those of Trebula by a patronus in the late fourth or in the fifth century. The amphitheatre of Velitrae (Velletri) was restored by a principalis curiae in 364/7, and the meat-market {macellum) of Aesernia (Isernia) by a vir primarius and his son, perhaps in 350/64, with columns and tiles provided by the State. At Beneventum (Benevento), a benefactor ornamented a building in the mid fourth century, another built or restored an unidentified building (perhaps in the late fourth century), and in 375 Symmachus recorded how, after an earthquake, the aristoc­ racy of the town ‘insistently request private contributions for the embellishment of their city’. Symmachus himself seems to have resisted the temptation to contribute.18 17 For pa troni of towns and their role in the late Empire: Harmand, 432-47; Matthews, 2 3-4; Mrozek, 365-6. In the towns there was perhaps less change in the role of the patronatus between the early and the late Empire than there was in other spheres of life. 18 Amiternum: Ann. Ep. (1937), no. 119. Sena: CIL vi. 1793 (this inscription is on the base of a statue erected in Rome, and so certainly commemorating a Roman aristocrat). Saepinum: CIL ix. 2447 (for the date: PLRE I, Maximus 35). Ocriculum: CIL xi. 4095 = ILS 5696. Interamna Lirenas: CIL x. 5349. Trebula: CIL x. 4559, the inscription is corrupt and in parts difficult to interpret; it is roughly datable since the baths restored are called ‘thermas Constantinianas’. Velitrae: CIL x. 6565 = ILS 5632. Aesemia: CIL ix. 2638 = ILS 5588 (for the date: PLRE I, Iustinianus 3) ‘acceptis columnis et tegulis a re publica*. Beneventum: CIL ix. 1577 (for the date: PLRE I, Octavianus 2); CIL ix. 1580 (for the date: PLRE I, Lupus 4); Symmachus, Ep. I. 3; and Matthews, 24. For a curator rei publicae and patronus of Capua, perhaps building with his own money, see p. 16

Late Antiquity

21

Even in some of the inscriptions that record these rare cases of private patronage we can see one of the reasons why such munificence had ceased to be popular. On the two inscriptions from Saepinum and Aesernia, and possibly also on one of those from Beneventum, the governor, though only the supervisor of the building and not its financer, took most of the credit: he is mentioned first and described as the motivat­ ing force, while the private patron is relegated to the second place of honour.19 Only in Rome itself do we find instances of private secular patronage in the late fifth and early sixth centuries (see Chapter 3); in the rest of Italy what little private building survived into late antiquity ends dramatically at the time of the Visigothic invasions. As we shall see, building and repair by governors and the erection of statues by townships ends at this same time. The crisis seems to have delivered a blow to security, confidence, and wealth, from which the old traditions of patronage never recovered.20 Major civic building and repair disappeared even earlier than privately financed work. This was more likely the result of a seizure of most civic revenue by the imperial government and the transference of what was left to the provincial gov­ ernors, than of a total collapse of this income. The financing of late antique towns is an obscure and debated subject. Summae honorariae, paid by incoming decurions and magis­ trates, probably ceased altogether in Italy, and any endow­ ments in money will have been rendered valueless by the inflation of the third century, but civic lands and civic fines n. 7 above. Harmand, 436, cites two further inscriptions recording repair work at Ausculum and Casinum as examples of late antique munificence by patroni: CIL ix. 665 = ILS 5784 and CIL x. 5200. However, neither inscription is datable, though that from Casinum may be late since it refers to repair of baths fallen into disuse ‘post seriem annorum*. 19 Saepinum: ‘Fabius Maximus v(ir) c(larissimus) re[c]tor provinciae, . . . restituit; curante Neratio Consta[nte] patrono, sumtu propio [stc] .* Aesernia: ‘. . . A[u]tonio Iustiniano rectore provinciae disponen(te), Castricius vir primarius sumptu proprio fieri curavit, cum Silverio filio . . .’. Beneventum: ‘. . . Fl(avius) Lupus v(ir) c(larissimus) cons(ularis) Camp(aniae), faciente de proprio Insontio Secundino.’ This seems to be the sense of the inscription, but it is not fully clear: perhaps ‘restituit’ is missing after ‘cons(ularis) Camp(aniae)*. 20 The years around 400 were also a time of widespread conversion of the Roman aristocracy to Christianity: in Chapter 4 I shall examine the effects of this on the patterns of patronage.

22

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

and exactions certainly did not entirely disappear. However, the Theodosian Code shows that the remaining revenues from these were, in the fourth and fifth centuries, subject to confiscation by the emperors. The lion’s share remained always in the imperial treasury, but in the late fourth century various ways of granting back part of the money in order to finance the upkeep of towns’ buildings and services were attempted. In 374 Valentinian I granted back to the towns a third of the revenue from civic lands to maintain public buildings, and this law was repeated in 395. At the same time the towns recovered a third of their revenue from taxation: ‘Lest splendid cities and towns collapse through age, we allot a third of the revenue from public land to the repair of buildings and the heating of baths’.21 Day-to-day mainten­ ance and minor repair financed with this money probably remained under the control of the town administration, though we know exceedingly little about this sort of work, since it was never recorded in inscriptions. However, in the administrative documents of the Ostrogothic period we still find the king addressing the possessoribus, defensoribus et curialibus, of Catina (Catania) concerning repair of the walls, of Parma concerning the clearance of sewers, and of Aestunae concerning the sending of stone from ruined public buildings to Ravenna.22 There is no reference to any civic efforts more major than these: the basic maintenance of a few essential buildings and the provision of materials for reuse in the building programme of the.central government. The only public monuments put up by the towns them­ selves, or by groups within the town, were the statues designed to please the powerful of the age: emperors, governors, and patroni. A large number of dedicatory inscriptions recording these survive from the late third and fourth centuries, and are listed in Appendix 1. There is a heavy concentration, amongst 11 C. Th. XV. 1. 32 (395), 18 (374), iv. 13. 7 (374). All the fourth- and fifthcentury legislation concerning revenues from civic lands and exactions is admirably and concisely discussed, with full citations, by Jones, LRE> 732-3. Civic funds were always very vulnerable to imperial confiscation in times of need: see Procopius, Sec. Hist. xxvi. 6-11 and 33-4 (Loeb edition, voi. vi, pp. 302-5 and 314-15). 22 Variae iii. 49, viii. 29, and iii. 9. See p. 16 n. 7 above for the re-erection of a statue at Faventia in the reign of Theodoric, done by a man who may perhaps only have been curator rei publicae, and, if so, using civic funds.

Late Antiquity

23

the statues to governors and patroni, in the provinces immedi­ ately south of Rome (Campania and, to a lesser extent, Samnium). This is certainly because in these areas two traditions lasted longest. Firstly, the traditional wish to be commemorated with a statue, which Ammianus Marcellinus specifically attributed to the Roman aristocracy and appar­ ently already felt was rather old-fashioned: Some of these senators eagerly seek to have statues erected to them, thinking that by this means they will be well thought of through all ages, and that they would gain more reward from senseless bronze images than from the knowledge o f having acted honestly and honourably. They also wish their statues to be gilded . . i 23

An inscription from just south of Rome at Praeneste (Palestrina) shows that here, in 385, a local notable was still happy to buy commemoration after death in the traditional form of a statue: he left property to the town on condition that one be erected to him in the forum.24 Secondly, these were also the areas where the old habits of secular munificence lasted longest, and therefore where more people were likely to be commemorated in the traditional manner: a mid-fourthcentury governor of Samnium, who was a particularly active builder, had statues erected to him in gratitude in four differ­ ent towns of his province.25 As is clear from Appendix 1, not even statues were regularly erected by the townships after the beginning of the fifth century. This evidence again seems to confirm how traumatic was the crisis begun by the Visigothic invasions. Already in the fourth century anything more major than a few repairs and the erection of statues became the responsi­ bility, not of the civic administration, but of the provincial governor. This is clear from the Theodosian Code, in which the section ‘On Public Works’ (De operibus publicis) contains fifty-one laws addressed to governors, and only two to town 23 Amm. Marc. xiv. 6. 8. 24 Praeneste: CIL xiv. 2934 = ILS 8375. For two surviving portrait-statues from late antique Italy: R. de Chirico, ‘Nuova statua-ritratto del basso impero trovata ad Ostia’, Bullettino della commissione archeologica del governatorato di Roma (normally Bull, della comm. arch, comunale di Rom a), 69 (1941), 113-28; M. Napoli, ‘Statua ritratto di Virio Audenzio Emiliano consolare della Campania’, Bollettino d ’A rte, 44 (1959), 107-13. 25 See Appendix l.A Jii, Allifae, Saepinum, Aesernia, and Iuvanum.

24

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

councils.26 It is also abundantly clear from the evidence of Italian inscriptions. There are, to the best of my knowledge, no fourth-qentury or later inscriptions recording work carried out at the initiative of a town administration more important than the erection or re-erection of statues. But there is a size­ able number recording major public works ordered by gov­ ernors, or by other imperial officials in no way answerable to the town, such as Rome’s praefectus annonae, who assumed control of the public buildings of Ostia, and the prefect of the fleet, who became responsible for those of Misenum (Miseno).27 Evidence of major work by governors is restricted to the fourth and very early fifth centuries, in the cases when it can be dated. The most active province was that of Campania. A governor of 333 paved streets at Abella, and had a statue erected to him at Praeneste (Palestrina) ‘because, in his benevolence, he ordered the reconstruction and repair of public buildings collapsed in ruins’. In 379/82 a governor restored the baths of Antium (Anzio), and in 394/5 one working in conjunction with the praefectus praetorio vice gerens repaired the banks of a stream at Puteoli (Pozzuoli), and perhaps also restored a basilica there. A governor who may have been of the late fourth century restored the baths of Tarracina (Terracina), and another, who cannot be dated except to the fourth or fifth centuries, was described at Puteoli (Pozzuoli) as ‘restorer of the baths’. At Capua in C.400 and at Puteoli in 409 governors were described as ‘repairer’ and ‘restorer’ ‘of public works’.28 Governors were 26 Y. Janvier, La Législation du bas-empire sur les édifices publics (Aix-enProvence, 1969) is a collection of the relevant texts (omitting laws on roads and aqueducts), with also a French translation and a brief introduction. 27 Ostia: Ch ast agnol, Préfec tu re, 50-1. The most famous case is the repair of a temple of Hercules as late as 393/4: Ann. Ep. (1941), no. 66. Misenum: CIL X . 3344 = ILS 5902, restoration of a bridge by a prefect of the fourth or fifth centuries. The man acted in a joint capacity as prefect of the fleet at Misenum and as curator rei publicae of the town. These two posts, which gave the naval officer control of the fleet’s base, were also combined at the naval bases of Ravenna and Comum (Como); Not. Dig., Occ. 42. 7 and 42. 9 (p. 215). 28 Abella: CIL x. 1199 = ILS 5510. Praeneste: CIL xiv. 2919 = IL S 1219 (for the governor: PLRE I, Pompeianus 4). Antium: CIL x. 6656 = ILS 5702. Puteoli stream: CIL x. 1690-2 = IL S 5894, 5894a, and 792. Puteoli basilica: CIL x. 1693-4 = ILS 791. Tarracina: CIL x. 6312 (for the governor: PLRE I, Vindicianus 4). Puteoli baths: CIL x. 1707 = ILS 5692 (for the governor: PLRE I, Rusticus 3).

Late Antiquity

25

also active in Campania in re-erecting statues in new positions (seebelow) andin setting up new statues: in Neapolis (Naples) to Constantine, in Puteoli (Pozzuoli) to Carinus in 282/3 and to the ‘Good Fortune of the Times’ {Felicitas Temporis) of Valentinian I in the later fourth century, and in Beneventum (Benevento) perhaps to Valentinian himself.29 In the province of Samnium most of the evidence concerns the work of one man, governor in 352/7, who seems to have been a dedicated restorer of buildings. He restored baths at Telesia, Allifae, and Saepinum (this latter with private money), built a secretarium (probably a judgement-hall) at Iuvanum, restored the Capitol at His'tonium, and in inscriptions from Allifae, Aesernia, and Iuvanum was described as ‘builder’ and ‘restorer’ ‘of public buildings’.30 With one of his successors he built a tribunal (probably for judgements) at Saepinum.31 Capua: CIL x. 3860 = ILS 1276 (for the governor: PLRE II, Lampadius 7). Puteoli in 409: CIL x. 1702 (for the governor: PLRE II, Paulinus 16). A fragmentary in­ scription from Beneventum (Benevento), CIL ix. 1596 = ILS 5511, may perhaps also refer to a governor of Campania; the man, whose name is lost, is described as ‘[repar]atori fori pro magna [parte cojnlapsi in ruin(as) cotidie [auctas], resti­ tutori basilicae . . . [cu]m porticibus sagitta[riorum et] regionis viae novae, rep­ t a t o r i] thermarum Commodianarum, re[para]tori collegiorum, reparatori [porti]cus Dianae, reparatori basilicae [Ljongini ac totius prope civitatis [post h] ostile incendium conditori, . . .’. Because of the reference to ‘hostile incendium’, the inscription has been attributed to Narses, after the Gothic capture óf Beneven­ tum; since no other capture of the town in imperial times is known (CIL ix. 1596; Fiebiger-Schmidt, no. 218). However, the inscription has no stylistic parallel later than the fourth century in Italy, and refers to a scale of restoration for which there is no evidence elsewhere in Byzantine Italy. It should also be noted that it perhaps goes on to refer to a local man (‘[ob] insignia eius in omnem pro[v]in[ciam] praecipua in se et patriam [urbem mjerita . . .’), and also that Procopius’ account of the capture of Beneventum by the Goths mentions destruction only to the walls, and not to the town (which would be wholly uncharacteristic of the Goths): Procopius, Gothic War iii. 6. 1 (Loeb edition, voi. iv, p. 197). I believe the inscription to be fourth-century or earlier and feel that a Byzantine date is very unlikely. 29 Neapolis: CIL x. 1482. Puteoli: CIL x. 1655 and 1656 = ILS 764. Beneven­ tum: CIL x. 1566 (for the dedication and date: PLRE I, Scopius). 30 For the governor: PLRE I, Maximus 35. Telesia: CIL ix. 2212 = ILS 5690. Allifae baths: CIL ix. 2338 = IL S 5691. Saepinum baths: CIL ix. 2447, for the private money see p. 21 n. 19 above; a fragmentary inscription, CIL ix. 2463, may possibly be a dedication to him here as ‘instaurator moenium ’.Iuvanum secretarium : CIL ix. 2957 = ILS 5521. Histonium: CIL ix.2842 = ILS 5362. Allifae inscription: CIL ix. 2337 = ILS 1247. Aesernia: CIL ix. 2639 = ILS 1248. Iuvanum inscrip­ tion: CIL ix. 2956 = IL S 5341. The work at Telesia and Iuvanum was supervised by the local ordo, and both the bath-building and the tribunal (see next note) at Saepinum by a local patronus. 31 C IL ix . 2448 = IL S 5524; Ann. Ep. (1930), no. 120.

26

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

Another governor organized the private repair of a meatmarket {macellum) at Aesernia.32 In the province of Flaminia at Picenum a governor of 339/50, in conjunction with his father, the praefectus urbi of Rome, supervised the restoration of a bridge and its approach-road at Tibur (Tivoli).33 In 375/8 at Segusio (Susa) in the province of Alpes Cottiae a bath was built by a man who was probably the governor.34 If we look also at evidence of minor building work, we find governors in Venetia et Histria setting up statues to Diocletian and to Maximian at Patavium (Padova), erecting two unspec­ ified things, perhaps also statues, at Brixia (Brescia) in the early or mid fourth century, moving a statue at Verona in 379/83, setting up a statue to Diocletian near Aquileia, and supervising the erection of statues to the emperors in Aquileia itself in 382/91.35 In Tuscia et Umbria and in Liguria correctores Italiae erected a statue to Diocletian at Florentia (Flor­ ence) in 287, and a temple at Comum (Como) in 286/93.36 At Salernum (Salerno), in the only part of Bruttium et Lucania considered by me, a governor erected a statue to Helena, mother of Constantine, in 324/6.37 For Aemilia and a small late creation, Valeria, I have found no evidence; most of Bruttium et Lucania, and all of Apulia et Calabria, Sicilia, Sardinia, and Corsica, I have excluded because they fall 32 See pp. 20-1 nn. 18 and 19 above. A fragmentary inscription from Venafrum (Venafro) perhaps recorded work to the baths of that town by another governor of Samnium, probably of the mid to late fourth century: CIL x. 4865 (for the date: PLRE I, Quintilianus 2). 33 Unusually the work was carried out by the ‘senatus populusq(ue) Romanus*, ‘curante* (= supervised by) both the praefectus urbi and the corrector Flaminiae et Piceni, another unusual arrangement: CIL xiv. 3582 = ILS 729; C/L xiv. 3583 (for the praefectus: PLRE I, Apronianus 9; for the corrector: PLRE I, Secundus 6). The same corrector was responsible for a dedication to Constantine on an arch at Fanum Fortunae (Fano): CIL xi. 6218/19 = ILS 706. 34 CIL V . 7250 = IL S 5701. The inscription is known only from manuscript readings which do not record the name and titles of the builder adequately. For a good brief account of it: PLRE I, Anonymus 111. An earlier governor (PLRE I, Saturninus 8) supervised the erection of statues to Diocletian and to Maximian by the ordo of Susa: CIL v. 7248 and 7249. 35 Patavium: CIL v. 2817 = ILS 614; CIL v. 2818. Brixia: CIL v. 4327 and 4328 (for the governor: PLRE I, Gaudentius 8). Verona: CIL v. 3332 = ILS 5363. Near Aquileia: CIL v. 8205 in 286. Aquileia: Ann. Ep. (1934), no. 236. 36 Florentia: CIL xi. 1594. Comum: Ann. Ep. (1919), no. 52 (PLRE I, Titianus 9). Here the work was carried out iussu of Diocletian and Maximian, and curante the local curator rei publicae. 37 Salernum: CIL x .5 1 7 = ILS 708.

Late Antiquity

27

outside the area of this study. This work by the governors was probably financed by the remaining civic income allowed to the towns by the emperors, which the Theodosian Code shows us was firmly under the governors’ control. Several laws in the Code are aimed at preventing abuse of this power: for instance, at stopping governors concentrating the resources of a number of towns on the one town of their residence.38 If, as I shall argue below, the apparent concentration of work by governors in two fourth-century provinces is not deceptive, this may well reflect both the extreme conserva­ tism of the areas influenced by the senatorial aristocracy of Rome, and the effect of Italy’s problems from about 400 onwards, since governors’ efforts (as well as private munifi­ cence) appear to stop in the first decade of the fifth century.39 The only later examples of inscriptions recording governors’ works which are known to me are two that commemorate the re-erection of statues: one in 423/50 by a governor of Campania in Beneventum, and one by a man who may well have been the Ostrogothic comes civitatis in Faventia (Faenza).40 Unless the end of governors’ work was the result of a new and unrecorded seizure of all civic income by the emperors in the West, it must be a reflection of a decline in time of crisis of what local income remained that could be made available for public building, and perhaps also of a tendency to divert all possible funds into emergency works, such as 38 Jones, L R E , 757-8. Laws to prevent the moving of statues and building material: C. Th. xv. 1. 1 (357) and 14 (365). To prevent the moving of resources for games: C. Th. xv. 5. 1 (372), 3 (409), and 4 (424). However, C. Th. xv. 1 .2 6 (390) even allowed governors to finance building in the ‘clariores urbes per singulas quasque provincias* by using the building-money of lesser towns, as long as their own allowances were already used up and as long as the central government was informed. Unfortunately, our evidence of governors’ building in Italy is not detailed enough to see if these ills were rife in the peninsula. However, in Ostro­ gothic times we find the central government itself ordering building materials to be sent from lesser towns to the royal residence of Ravenna: Variae iii. 9 materials from ruined public buildings at Aestunae; Variae v. 8 materials, probably old (but just possibly new blocks in transit), from Faventia (Faenza). 39 It is also possible that the towns of Campania at least were better endowed than those of other areas of Italy; the province is, however, known to have suffered economic problems in the fourth century: C. Th. xi. 28. 2;Jones, ‘Storia economica*, 1582. 40 Beneventum: CIL ix. 1563 = IL S 5479. Faventia: CIL xi. 268 = FiebigerSchmidt, no. 182 (see next note for a discussion of this inscription).

28

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

patching up the walls. In Ostrogothic times, when there is a substantial amount of evidence for public building (admittedly almost entirely from royal documents), there is no record of major repairs carried out from normal income by governors. The only certain cases of governors being active in public building are a consularis ordered to send blocks from Faventia (Faenza) to Ravenna and a comes Syracusanae civitatis, who restored the town walls, though not with ordinary income, but with a special levy from the citizens.41 Alongside the activity of the governors was a certain amount of direct patronage by the central governments, which reached beyond the early fifth century. In this period of difficulties it was particularly active in repairing and im­ proving defensive works: Honorious in about 401-2 greatly improved those of Rome, one of his generals, Constantius (himself briefly Emperor in 421), repaired those of Albingaunum (Albenga), Valentinian III (425-50) added to those of Neapolis (Naples) and probably to those of Ravenna, and Theodoric and Athalaric improved those of Ravenna, Ticinum (Pavia), Verona, and Arelatae (Arles).42 The most impressive defensive works were those around the capitals and residences, and this concentration of patronage on favoured towns was a marked feature of imperial and royal building. Rome, although no longer an imperial residence, continued to enjoy imperial patronage as the historic centre of Empire, as we shall see in the next chapter. Ostia, as Rome’s harbour-town, was also favoured: the Maritime Baths (Thermae Maritimae) were 41 Faventia: Variae v. 8 to a consularis (presumably of Picenum et Flaminia: see PLRE II, Anastasius 11). Syracuse: Variae ix. 14. The comes was not a civil governor of fourth-century type, but a new military governor: Variae vi. 22, the Formula Comitivae Syracusanae; Jones, L R E , 257. A fragmentary inscription from Faventia (Faenza) records the re-erection of a fallen statue by a Goth, Gudila, ‘com(es) [. . . e t curajtor r(ei) p(u)b(licae)’: CIL xi. 268 = FiebigerSchmidt, no. 182. Gudila may have been acting as curator of the town, but it is very possible that he was also the Gothic military governor, comes civitatis, of Faenza and acting as such. For the continued existence of the older civil governors in Ostrogothic times, besides Variae v. 8: Variae vi. 21 (the Formula Rectoris Provinciae), iii. 27 and iv. 10 (consularis Campaniae), and xii. 8 (consularis Liguriae). 42 These are discussed in Chapter 9. At Albenga Constantius apparently also restored the forum and the port. The other works to town walls recorded in the Variae did not involve royal money: Variae iii. 49 Catina (Catania); Variae ix. 14 Syracusae (Syracuse).

Late Antiquity

29

restored in 375/8 with imperial money, and possibly other baths in 340/50; in the early fifth century an imperial portico seems to have been built at Portus, the port itself.43 Unfortunately, no building inscriptions have survived from late antique Mediolanum (Milan), the favourite imperial resi­ dence in Italy in the late third and the fourth centuries. How­ ever, the remains of the late antique circus and town walls still exist, and these are on a scale that could only have been imperial, and we also know from a written source that Maximian endowed the town with unspecified buildings that probably included a bath.44 In the late fourth century Ausonius listed the magnificent buildings of this imperial capital, its walls, circus, theatre, temples, palace, mint, baths, porticoes, and statues: A fine town enlarged by its twin walls, with a circus for the enjoy­ ment of the people, a theatre with its blocks of seats, temples, palaces, a rich mint, and a region famous for its baths of Hercules. It also has colonnades adorned with marble statues, and walls all around like an earth rampart (?) [ m o e n ia e q u e in v a lli f o r m a m c ir c u m d a ta l i m b o ].45

Sadly, for Ravenna, the capital from the beginning of the fifth century, there is even less information. We know it had splendid imperial walls and an imperial palace, but there is no information on the traditional public buildings until 43 Thermae Maritimae: CIL xiv. 137 = IL S 5694. Other (?)baths: CIL xiv. 135, which certainly refers to an imperial repair, but not necessarily to baths. Portus: CIL xiv. 140 = IL S 805, which refers to the erection of statues in 425/50 ‘ad ornatum porticus Placidianae*. 44 Circus and town wall: Storia di Milago i, 530-5 and 493-507. Maximian: Aurelius Victor, xxxix. 45, ‘Veterrimae religiones castissime curatae, ac mirum in modum novis adhuc cultisque pulchre moenibus Romana culmina et ceterae urbes ornatae, maxime Carthago, Mediolanum, Nicomedia.’ The reference to ‘Herculei lavacri’ in Ausonius’ poem (see below) suggests they were the work of Maximian, who was considered in propaganda a colleague of Hercules. For% a plan and brief account of possible remains of these: M. Mirabella Roberti, ‘Architettura civile tardoantica fra Milano e Aquileia’, Antichità Altoadriatic h e, iv (Udine, 1973), 161-3. 45 Ausonius, Ordo urbium nobilium, vii Mediolanum. Compare the splendours of fourth-century Trier, another imperial residence: E. M. Wightman, Roman Trier and the Treveri (London, 1970), 92-119; and for continued building by governors and emperors in a favoured eastern capital, Ephesus: C. Foss Ephesus after A ntiquity (Cambridge, 1979), 21-9. For praise of late antique emperors for their building: e.g. Pan. vii. 22 and v. 4. For hostile views of the same activity: Lactantius, De mortibus persecutorum , vii. 8-10 (= Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiastieorum Latinorum, 27, p. 181) on Diocletian; Procopius, Sec. Hist. xxvi. 23 (Loeb edition, voi. vi, pp. 308-11) on Justinian.

30

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

Ostrogothic times, when Theodoric is recorded to have repaired the aqueduct and to have laid out gardens near the town.46 Ravenna continued as the Byzantine capital after the Lombard conquest of much of the peninsula, though without a resident king or emperor, and in around 600 it received the last recorded instance of Roman imperial patronage in Italy, when Maurice Tiberius again restored the aqueduct.47 The Ostrogoths also embellished their other capitals. At Verona, Theodoric built or repaired the walls, the aqueduct, baths, a palace, and a colonnade, and at Pavia the walls, baths, a palace, and the amphitheatre.48 As far as the evidence allows us to see, this was imperial and royal patronage on a scale not remotely reached in lesser towns, which were not the rulers’ residences. In these, only very occasional imperial and royal building is recorded: in Neapolis (Naples) Constantine repaired both the forum and the aqueduct, and in Spoletium (Spoleto) Constantius and Julian repaired the baths, while Theodoric is known to have repaired the aqueduct of Parma, to have provided free bathing for the citizens of Spoletium, and to have authorized the repair by a bishop (apparently privately) of another aqueduct, perhaps of Vercellae (Vercelli).49 A consideration of the extent of late antique patronage of public buildings, by the few private donors, by governors, and by emperors and kings, reveals it to have been very res­ tricted, and to have in no way satisfactorily filled the gap left by the almost total disappearance of private patronage. Build­ ing by the emperors and kings was, as we have seen, largely 46 Aqueduct: Variae v. 38; Fiebiger, ‘Zweite Folge’, no. 7; Anon. Vales., c. 71 (p. 324); Cassiodorus, Chronica, p. 160 a.502-3. Gardens: CIL xi. 10 = ILS 826 = Fiebiger-Schmidt, no. 179. 47 CIL xi. 11 = ILS 836. The inscription is fragmentary, but enough survives to show that it recorded an imperial repair; the name of the emperor is in the nominative, and that of the governor (Smaragdus) in the accusative. 48 Anon. Vales., c. 71 (p. 324). Ostrogothic work on the amphitheatre of Pavia is confirmed by an inscription of Athalaric: CIL v. 6418 = ILS 829 = Panazza, 232-3 no. 10. Theodoric’s palaces at Pavia and Verona are also mentioned by Fredegar, 82 (Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, ii). 49 Constantine: Lib. Pont. i. 186, confirmed (for the aqueduct) by the inscription Ann. E p. (1939), no. 151 datable to 323/4. From this we learn that the aqueduct also served Puteoli, Nola, Atella, Cumae, Acerrae, Baiae, and Misenum. Constantius and Julian: CIL xi. 4781 = IL S 739 in 355/60. Theodoric: Variae viii. 29 and 30 (Parma); ii. 37 (Spoletium); iv. 31 (?Vercellae: for this see my p. 145-6).

Late A n tiquity

31

restricted to a few towns, and that by the governors to the period before about 410 and, for the most part, to two central Italian provinces. What little private- patronage is recorded was also largely within this same period and this same area. The range of buildings added to and repaired was also very limited: town walls, palaces, aqueducts, and baths are fairly frequently mentioned, but other types of building (such as fora in general, basilicae, curiae, porticoes, street-paving, markets, theatres, and amphitheatres) are rarely, if ever, referred to. At Ostia there is considerable evidence, both from excavation and inscriptions, for the continued repair of most of the baths, but very little for any other category of building.50 There were certainly many buildings in ruins, even in those towns where repair work did take place, and there seem to have been few such towns in the fourth century and almost none in the fifth and sixth centuries. This picture, which is derived largely from the chance survival of inscriptions, is obviously not complete, since a great many inscriptions must be lost, since some major work may even have been carried out without record, and since we do not know how effective day-to-day maintenance was and how this might have affected the life of a building. Un­ fortunately, because archaeologists of all nationalities working in Italy have been little interested in dating reliably the abandonment of public buildings, we are forced to argue more from a lack of evidence of repair than from any good evidence of decay. However, I believe the argument from silence to be reasonable, particularly because we do have one single category of building, the baths, for whose continued repair there is a substantial corpus of evidence; this would suggest very strongly that the lack of evidence for other buildings is significant. Also, as we shall see, in Rome, where repair continued until the Byzantine reconquest, this con­ tinued to be carefully recorded in inscriptions, of which a 50 Meiggs, 146, 407, 411-12; however, see his p. 583 for the abandonment in the third century of one bath-building. F. Zevi, ‘Miscellanea Ostiense’, A tti della Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei. Rendiconti. Classe di Scienze morali, storiche e filologiche, ser. 8, voi. xxvi (1971), 449-79 (p. 467 \ . . le cure degli imperatori del IV secolo si rivolgono quasi esclusivamente al restauro degli edifici termali’).

32

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

number have survived. The motives for repairing the secular public buildings were so closely bound up with a desire for worldly glory that a commemorative inscription would very seldom be omitted. In the absence of much good archaeological work, the positive evidence of decay that exists is often very general, and can only rarely be pinned down to specific buildings or types of building. A series of laws in the Theodosian Code ordered the governors of the Empire to concentrate their efforts on repairing ruinous existing buildings, rather than on building new ones, and other decrees attempted to control the booming trade in reusable pieces {spolia) from ruined public buildings.51 Specifically Italian evidence is plentiful. Already in about 333 it was a source of pride to a governor of Campania that he had paved streets, not with spolia, but with new blocks: ‘with blocks cut from the mountains, not taken from ruined monuments’.52 The late antique churches of Italy, from the time of Constantine onwards, were almost all built from the materials of older public buildings. In 401 a law was enacted to allow vacant and useless public land and buildings to be leased to private individuals, with the rent going to the upkeep of the town, and in Ostrogothic times we find the State encouraging the reuse of collapsed materials and alienating useless and ruinous public buildings free of charge, in the hope that a private owner could keep them standing.53 From the fourth and fifth centuries there are also a group of inscriptions recording the re-erection of statues on new sites. Governors of Campania moved statues ‘from a hidden 51 C. Th. XV. 1. 2 (321), 3 (326), 14 (365), 15 (365), 16 (365), 17 (365), 20 (380), and 21 (380) forbid governors to build anew, unless repair and completion are first carried out (xv. 1. 15: » priusquam ea, quae victa senio fatiscerent, repararent’). C. Th. xv. 1. 27 (390), 28 (390), 31 (394), and 37 (398) forbid governors to start new buildings ‘industriae captare famam’. Repair work was clearly not as prestigious as new work: see p. 40 n. 9 below. Spolia: C. Th. xv. 1. 36 (397) assigned the material from demolished temples to the repair of roads, bridges, aqueducts, and town walls. C. Th. xv. 1 .4 0 (398), 41 (401), and 43 (405) ordered that only ruined and useless public buildings could be alienated (xv. 1.40: ‘Si aliquando operum publicorum petitores emergant, non nisi diruta penitusque destructa et quae parum sint usui civitatum petitoribus adsignentur’). 52 CIL X . 1199 = ILS 5510 Abella (for the governor: PLRE I, Pompeianus 4). 53 401 law:C. Th. xv. 1 .4 1 ,‘si neque usui neque ornatui civitatis adcommodum videtur’. For the Ostrogothic period see Chapter 10, section II, below.

Late A ntiquity

33

place in the town to the thronged Severan baths’ at some date before 383 in Liternum, and a statue ‘found in a hidden place and taken to decorate a much used area’ in 423/50 at Beneventum. Also at Beneventum a curator rei publicae, perhaps in the late third or early fourth century, moved a statue ‘from a hidden place to the use and splendour of the baths’. A governor of Campania who set up statues, perhaps in the late fourth century, at Tarracina (Terracina), was probably also re-erecting old statues on a new site. In 379/82 a governor of Venetia et Histria re-erected a statue at Verona ‘in the crowded forum, after it had lain for a long time in the temple of the Capitoline gods’, and at Ostia, perhaps in the late fourth century, a praefectus annonae moved a statue ‘from a neglected site, in order to decorate the forum and adorn a public area’. Finally, under Theodoric, at Faventia (Faenza) a curator rei publicae (also possibly comes civitatis) re-erected a statue perhaps toppled by an earthquake.54 Many of these statues were perhaps from abandoned temples, though this is only explicitly stated in the case of the statue from the Capitolium of Verona; I shall discuss this question in more detail in the next chapter dealing with Rome, where most inscriptions recording the re-erection of statues have been found. Certainly these inscriptions give a powerful im­ pression of monumental areas becoming very restricted, with the ornaments of outlying ruined buildings being moved into those few places that were still being kept up: in two cases the forum, and in two others the baths. Old age remained the principal enemy of buildings, as it had been in classical times.55 Occasionally its effects on one 54 Liternum: CIL x. 3714 (for the date: PLRE I, Aemilianus 4). Beneventum governor: CIL ix. 1563, Beneventum curator: CIL ix. 1588 = ILS 5480 (for the date: PLRE I, Crescens 4). Tarracina: CIL x. 6313 and A nn. Ep. (1912), no. 99 (for the date: PLRE I, Vindicianus 4). Verona: CIL v. 3332. Ostia: CIL xiv. 4721 (for the date PLRE I, Clementinus 3). Faventia: CIL xi. 268 = Fiebiger-Schmidt, no. 182 (see p. 28 n. 41 above). There is no evidence that any of these statues were transferred from other towns, a practice condemned in C. Th. xv. 1. 1 (357) and 14 (365). ss For the classical period, see pp. 12-13 nn. 3 4 -6 above. Examples of baths stated to be damaged by age (and on occasion neglect) in the fourth and fifth centuries: CIL vi. 1165 Rome; CIL vi. 1703 = ILS 5715 Rome; CIL vi. 1750=/L S 5703 Rome; CIL ix. 2447 Saepinum; CIL x. 6656 = ILS 5702 Antium (Anzio); Ann. Ep. (1937), no. 119 Amiternum.

34

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

of those buildings that were lucky enough to be repaired are graphically described. A governor of Campania, who restored the baths of Antium (Anzio) in 379/82, gave this account of his work: ‘The baths were sordid in their ruinous state and dangerous in their structural insecurity, and the threat of collapse frightened people and kept them away. I repaired them by removing all the decay of age, and by rendering them structurally sound.’56 In Rome a praefectus urbi, who repaired baths on the Aventine in 414, also had his efforts described: ‘The wall of the tepidarium leant so far out of true that the whole structure threatened to collapse. He gave it support with a double arch built up from the foundations.57 In the early sixth century the decay of the seemingly rock-like solidity of Rome’s theatre of Pompey drew this lament from the pen of Cassiodorus: ‘Old Age, can nothing resist you, since you can shatter even this solid structure? One would have thought it more likely for mountains to subside, than this strong building to be shaken’.58 Other hazards are occa­ sionally mentioned, of which fire is the commonest.59 Baths at Allifae ‘toppled by earthquake’ were restored by a governor in 352/7, and in the late fifth century an inscription was erected in the Colosseum in Rome to record a repair to the ‘arena and balcony [podium], which had been demolished by a fearful earthquake’.60 An earthquake in Rome in 442/3 is described as having toppled statues and new porticoes.61 Unrest and barbarian invasion also contributed to the problem, though the immediate effects of these on solid buildings, except in the rare cases when fires were started, must have been minimal. The Visigothic sack of Rome in 410 involved a few localized fires, one of which burnt down the original church of S. Maria in Trastevere, while another 56 CIL X . 6656 = IL S 5702 57 CIL vi. 1703 = IL S 5715 58 Variae iv. 51. 59 Examples of baths damaged by fire in the fourth and fifth centuries: CIL x. 6312 Tarracina (Terracina); CIL xi. 4781 = ILS 739 Spoletium (Spoleto). 60 Allifae: CIL ix. 2338 = IL S 5691 (for the governor: PLRE I, Maximus 35; see p. 25 n. 30 above). Rome: CIL vi. 1716a, b, and c = 32094a, b, and c = ILS 5635 (for the date: Chastagnol, Sénat, 44). 61 Chronica Minora, i (= M onumenta Germaniae Historica, Auctores Antiquissimi, ix), p. 301, a.443. Recorded by Paul the Deacon, Hist. R o m . 13. 16, a.442 (= Fonti per la storia d*Italia, pubblicate dalVIstituto Storico Italiano, 51): ‘plurimae eius (= Romae) aedes aedificiaque corruerint’.

Late A ntiquity

35

possibly destroyed the Basilica Aemilia in the Forum; how­ ever, most of the city’s buildings survived structurally un­ damaged, though stripped of their precious ornaments.62 Also in Rome, the baths of Constantine had possibly been damaged in rioting before their repair in about 443, and two late fifthcentury inscriptions record the re-erection of statues, one of which had been overturned ‘by barbarian attack’ and the other broken ‘by the collapse of a roof set alight during a civil disturbance’. Finally, during the sieges and captures of the city in the Gothic Wars, we hear of damage to some of the extramural shrines by Gothic soldiery, of damage to the city’s buildings on the occasion of Totila’s first capture of Rome, and of a particularly dramatic incident when the classical statuary on the Mausoleum of Hadrian was used by the Greeks to bombard an attacking Gothic party.63 However, although all these violent incidents had their effect, it was certainly age, particularly if combined with neglect, that was the most fre­ quent and efficient destroyer in Rome and elsewhere.64 A further feature of the period, which is also indicative of its severe problems, are the increasingly common references 62 S. Maria: Lib. Pont. i. 230, repair in 422/32 ‘post ignem Geticum’. Basilica Aemilia: see p. 220 n. 49 below. For a general account of the sack and of Alaric’s attempts to restrain bloodshed and senseless damage: Orosius vii. 39 (= Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, 5, pp. 5 4 4 -8 ). For loss of ornaments: Lib. Pont. i. 233, replacement in 432/40 of Constantine’s great silver fastigium in S. Giovanni in Laterano, ‘quod a barbaris sublatum fuerat’. 63 Baths of Constantine: CIL vi. 1750 = ILS 5703 (for the probable date: PLRE II, Quadratianus 2, described as ‘longa incuria et abolendae civilis vel potius feralis cladis vastatione vehementer adflictas’; for a much earlier riot near this site: Amm. Marc, xxvii. 3. 8 (367). Statues: CIL vi. 1663 (PLRE II, Audax 3); CIL vi. 1664 (PLRE II, Faustus 4). A fragmentary inscription (CIL vi. 31890) mentions something (perhaps a statue) ‘hostili impetu sublata’, and may refer to the 455 Vandal sack (PLRE II, Valentinus 5). On this occasion the church of S. Ippolito at Portus was certainly burnt: IL C V 1788. Damage to extramural shrines by Goths: Lib. Pont. i. 291; Fiebiger-Schmidt, nos. 208-12 and 216 (this damage was almost certainly not officially sanctioned, since Witigis is reported to have treated the shrines of St. Peter and St. Paul with scrupulous respect: Procopius, Gothic War, ii. 4. 9-10 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 320-1)). Totila: Gothic War, iii. 22. 8, iii. 37. 3, and iv. 33. 14 (Loeb edition, voi. iv, pp. 344-5, voi. v. pp. 12-13 and 392-3). Mausoleum of Hadrian: Gothic War, i. 22. 22 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 214-17). 64 Even when no good evidence of deliberate, or even of sudden, destruction exists, archaeologists still tend to attribute the abandonment and decay of public buildings to specific tumults and invasions. Apparently the temptation of a neat cause and date for destruction is difficult to resist.

36

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

to duties of imperial subjects to provide free labour, materials, and money for repair, particularly of town walls, which were essential to the survival of the Empire. Much of our evidence comes from legislation in the Theodosian Code, which was not necessarily all current in Italy.65 A law of 396 addressed to the praefectus praetorio of Oriens ordered the rebuilding or repair of each town’s walls, with special levies of money raised on the land of each city’s territory, and a law of 412 addressed to the praefectus praetorio of Ulyricum ordered that no one should be exempt from the duties of supplying the army and of building fortifications {constructioni murorum ) .66 For Constantinople a law was enacted in 384 to prevent exemptions from a duty to contribute to harbourworks and to the Theodosian repair to the aqueduct, and in 413 the men through whose land the new city wall passed were made responsible for the maintenance of its towers.67 A law of 338 attempted to check grants of immunity from public building duties, but laws of 382 and 390 listed in detail the kinds of burdens that a privileged civil servant would escape: No contribution will be required of them for public works, artisan activity, or the preparation o f lime. The estates o f exempted men will not have to produce timber, neither firewood nor for building;. . . They will not be liable for the duty of constructing and repairing public and ecclesiastical buildings . . . nor roads and bridges .68

Fortunately, there is enough evidence to show that similar expedients (levies of labour, materials, and money) were also prevalent in Italy. A law of 365, designed to encourage the exaction of building materials rather than money, was ad­ dressed to the governor of Picenum (et Flaminia).69 In 440 Valentinian III ordered that the praefectus urbi of Rome should ‘repair those stretches of wall and those towers and gates which are ruinous, and that in this repair to the city walls and to all those buildings set out above he should excuse 45 Italy is not as well endowed with information as Antioch in Syria, where Libanius in the late fourth century recorded forced labour for transporting building materials and rubble and for cleaning sewers: Liebeschuetz, 133 and 219. 66 C. Th. XV. 1 .3 4 (396); 49 (412). 67 C. Th. xv. 1. 23 (384); 51 (413). 48 C. Th. xv. 1 .5 (338); xi. 16.15 (382); 18 (390). For exemption of senators and procurators: C. Th. xv. 1.7 (361); i. 32. 7 (389). 49 C. Th. xv. 1. 17 (365).

Late A ntiquity

37

no one from their obligation’.70 In Ostrogothic times we hear of a complaint to Athalaric about a governor of Syracuse who had exacted a special levy of money from the citizens in order to repair the town walls, and then failed to do so. Such exactions were clearly acceptable, if they bore fruit, since the King ordered the governor to complete the repairs, or, only failing that, to restore the money.71 Theodoric ordered the inhabitants of Feltria (Feltre) to build a fortress {castrum) in the Trentino, ‘and that no one, not even the Church, should be excused from these duties’, and issued a general decree that anyone with ‘stones lying around in their fields’ should hand these over for the repair of towns’ public buildings.72 By the end of late antiquity, which in Italy can conveni­ ently be taken as the Lombard invasion of 568, the pattern of secular patronage had already been largely formed. There were some important changes after this date, in particular the abandonment, even in royal capitals, of the secular luxuries offered by the baths and the entertainment buildings (see Chapters 6 and 7). However, much of what we shall encounter later was already present by the mid fifth century and firmly established by the mid sixth. Almost all the traditional secular buildings were already in ruins. Such public building as sur­ vived was concentrated above all on essentials, principally town walls, and was carried out mainly through labourservices firmly under the control of the central government and its local agents, the governors. Traditional, local, and private secular patronage had effectively died. 70 Leg. Nov. ad. Th., Nov. Val. v. 2-3. 71 Variae ix. 14: *. . . aut muri exinde pro earum munimine construantur aut unusquisque recipiat quod ei probatur incompetenter ereptum’. 72 Feltria: Variae v. 9. General decree: Variae i. 28.

3

Late Antique Rome As we have seen, the efforts to combat decay and destruction were in most towns spasmodic, even in the fourth century, and did not survive beyond the crisis years of the early fifth century. The only exceptions were the imperial and royal residences, such as Ravenna, Pavia, and Verona of the Ostro­ goths, and Rome itself, which was a case apart. Rome was never a regular imperial or royal residence after the reign of Maxentius (306-12), and even before this had already lost its position as the centre of power to towns nearer the frontiers, such as Trier, Sirmium, and Milan. However, it was still in the hearts of all Romans the home and first city of Empire: Ausonius, although his political life in the late fourth century revolved around Trier and Milan, can have had no hesitation in listing it first in his Order o f Noble Cities : ‘The first of all cities, home of the gods, is golden Rome.’1 The maintenance of Rome presented a particular problem, because it had become a depository for the huge buildings lavished on it by the emperors, buildings on a scale and in number far larger than can ever have been strictly useful, even at the height of the city’s size. In the fourth and very early fifth centuries a number of new buildings continued to be added: Diocletian built new baths, Maxentius built a circus on the Via Appia and began a huge basilica over the Forum, Constantine completed this and built large baths on the Quirinal, Constantius II after 357 transported to Rome and erected in the Circus Maximus a vast obelisk from Egypt, Valentinian I rebuilt two bridges and built two porticoes, Theodosius rebuilt one bridge, and Honorius made substantial additions to the walls.2 1 Ausonius, Ordo urbium nobilium , line 1. 2 Baths of Diocletian: Nash, ii. 448-53; Platner-Ashby, 527-30. Circus and basilica of Maxentius: Krautheimer, R o m e, 7-8; A. Frazer, ‘The Iconography of

Late Antique Rome

39

This activity did not reach far into the fifth century and, after Constantine’s baths, did not involve enormous building projects; but with it went a high esteem and concern for the buildings already there. From the first half of the fourth century have survived two brief accounts of the splendours of the city, the Curiosum and the Notitia Urbis Rom ae, and literary references to its glories are common.3 In the late fourth century Ammianus Marcellinus described the visit of Constantius II to Rome in 357, and the Emperor’s amaze­ ment at its buildings: ‘. . . the baths built as large as whole provinces; the huge Colosseum, built of well-jointed Travertine stone, whose top is almost beyond human vision; the Pantheon, with its lofty and beautiful dome, as large as a whole region of the city . . .’.4 The same sentiments of awe emerge in the official letters of Cassiodorus, written for the Ostrogothic kings: ‘It can truly be said that the whole of Rome is a marvel’; ‘a wonderful forest of buildings’; ‘in one city so much that amazes’.5 These buildings were as vulnerable to the ravages of nature and man as any other. For instance, from Ostrogothic times we hear of the damage of decay to bronze elephants on the Via Sacra and to the theatre of Pompey, and of thieving by man of Rome’s metal statues and of lead and bronze from its public buildings.6 Probably many of Rome’s buildings were already in a state of serious decay in the first half of the fourth century: Constantine, and later church-builders, the Emperor Maxentius’ Buildings in Via Appia’, A rt Bulletin, 48 (1966), 385-92; Nash, i. 180-2; Platner-Ashby, 76-8. Baths of Constantine: Platner-Ashby, 525-6. Obelisk: CIL vi. 1163 = CIL vi. 31249 = ILS 736; Amm. Marc. xvi. 10. 15-17 and xvii. 4. 1-23 (according to Ammianus, Constantius was deliberately seeking to rival the achievement of earlier emperors: see, above all, xvi. 10. 15-17 and xvii. 4. 12). The obelisk, which now stands by S. Giovanni in Laterano, is 32.50 m high and is the largest in the world: Platner-Ashby, 367-8; Nash, ii. 142-3. Valentinian’s bridges: see p. 187 n. 28 below. Valentinian’s porticoes: CIL vi. 1178 = ILS 5592; CIL vi. 1184 = ILS 781. Valentinian also dedicated a new (as yet undiscovered) forum, the Forum Palatinum, in 374 (CIL vi. 1177 = IL S 776), but this may have been a minor work of embellishment to a pre­ existing square. Theodosius’ bridge: see p. 187 n. 28 below. Honorius and the walls: CIL vi. 1188-90 = IL S 797 and Richmond, 241-62. 3 Curiosum and Notitia published in Cod. Top. Rom. i. 63-192. 4 Amm. Marc. xvi. 10. 13-17. 5 Variae vii. 15. 6 Elephants: Variae x. 30. Theatre: Variae iv. 51. Statues: Variae vii. 13. Metal: Variae iii. 31.

40

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

probably derived the huge quantities of spolia which they used in their buildings from the city itself, and in 364 Valentinian and Valens were already forbidding the praefectus urbi to begin any new building, and ordering him instead to restore those buildings ‘which are said to have fallen into unsightly decay’.78 Similar legislation for Rome was repeated in 376, 390, and 393.8 This was apparently not popular with all praefecti, since repair was less prestigious than new build­ ing: Ammianus Marcellinus tells a story of how a praefectus urbi of 365 (immediately after Valentinian and Valens’ legislation) evaded the problem by restoring, while recording his work in inscriptions worded as if to describe new building.910 In keeping with the size of its problem, Rome had a large and complex organization to look after its buildings, similar to that which existed to look after its food-supply and foodgrants. In the fourth century both organizations were brought under the control of the praefectus urbi. 10 Under him the most important officials in charge of public buildings, as they were listed in the Notitia Dignitatum, were the comes formarum (aided by a consularis aquarum)—in charge of the watersupply—the comes riparum et alvei Tiberis et cloacarum, the curatores operum maximorum and operum publicorum, and the curator statuarum . 11 This organization survived, substan­ tially unchanged, into the sixth century, when most of the officials reappear in the Variae of Ostrogothic times and in the Justinianic Pragmatic Sanction, which established the theoret­ ical basis of Byzantine rule over Italy after the reconquest.12 7 C. Th. XV. 1. 11 (S64). 8 C. Th. XV. 1. 19 (376); 27 (390); 29 (393). 9 Amm. Marc, xxvii. 3. 7: ‘Per omnia enim civitatis membra, quae diversorum principimi exornarunt impensae, nomen propium inscribebat, non ut veterum instaurator, sed conditor.* The inscriptions of his prefecture are collected by Chastagnol, Fastes, 168-9. Only one building-inscription (concerning a castellum of the Aqua Claudia)-survives, though several survive recording the erection or re-erection of statues. The inscriptions at Ostia cited by Bloch, ‘Pagan Revival’, 205-6 and figs. 11 and 12 are clearly mere marks of ownership. 10 This is fully dealt with by Chastagnol, Préfecture, 43-63. 11 N o t. Dig.y Occ. iv. (pp. 113-14). Also, perhaps, a tribunus rerum nitentium , whose function is unknown. 12 Pragmatic Sanction: Justinian, Novellae, 802, Appendix VII clause 25. Praefectus urbi: Variae vi. 4, and Pragmatic Sanction. Comes formarum: Variae vii. 6, and Pragmatic Sanction (the Consularis aquarum, however, disappears). Comes riparum etc.: Variae iii. 30 and 31, as curator cloacarum; in the Pragmatic

Late Antique Rome

41

The organization and much of its work were financed from a special fund, fed probably from local exactions and by con­ tributions from the arca vinaria, the money collected in Rome by the State from the distribution of cheap wine in the city.13 This money was expected to provide for most needs, and when in 365 a praefectus tried to requisition iron, lead, bronze, and other building materials, rather than pay for them ‘from the usual ‘funds’ (ex titulis solitis), this led to violence.14 Rome also depended, particularly for the wood that heated the baths and for its lime, on a complicated and vulnerable system of subventions in kind. In 384 the praefectus urbi Symmachus complained that, because Puteoli (Pozzuoli) was not receiving a due ration of free corn (annona) from that supplied to Rome from the provinces, it was unable to con­ tinue supplying corn to Tarracina (Terracina), a town whose well-being was vital to Rome, since it supplied free wood for the baths and free mortar for the buildings.15 Symmachus also complained that, because of the widespread issue of imperial grants of immunity from public duties, the mancipes salinarum, who had a monopoly of exploitation of the saltflats at Ostia, were no longer able to carry out satisfactorily their guild-duty of transporting to Rome wood for the baths.16 A series of fourth-century laws were aimed at ensuring a steady supply of lime for the repair of the aque­ ducts and other buildings of the city; this was provided Sanction. Curatores operum maximorum and operum publicorum : disappear. Curator statuarum : Variae vii. 13; not in Pragmatic Sanction. In the Variae, but not in the N ot. Dig. nor in the Pragmatic Sanction, are a curator palatii (perhaps, however, for Ravenna not Rome), a tribunus voluptatum (in charge of games and shows), and a praepositus calcis. Many of these changes are fully discussed by Chastagnol, Préfecture, who also uses the epigraphic evidence. 13 Chastagnol, Préfecture, 335-9. For the arca vinaria in the 350s and in Ostrogothic times: Symmachus, Rei. 34 and Anon. Vales., c. 67 (p. 324). In neither period was the emperor or king satisfied that the money was always being spent honestly or sensibly: Symmachus, Rei. 34 and Amm. Marc, xxvii. 3. 2 and 7 .3 ; Variae i. 21 and ii. 34. The arca vinaria was also meant to provide a quarter of the money payable to the burners and transporters of lime for the mortar of the city: C. Th. xiv. 6. 3 (365). 14 Amm. Marc, xxvii. 3 .1 0 . 15 Symmachus, Rei. 40: the letter also reveals the problems of dealing with different courts, officials, governors, and emperors, all reversing each other’s decisions. 16 Symmachus, Rei. 44.

42

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

as a public service by the inhabitants of the surrounding districts.17189 The day-to-day running of Rome’s buildings is shrouded in almost complete silence, except in the one year 384-5, when Symmachus was praefectus urbi and recorded some of his correspondence with the Emperor. For instance, we have no idea of the size of staff or budget under the various officials. About occasional major repairs we know rather more from the inscriptions put up by various praefecti urbi and their underlings to record their work. Thesé have sur­ vived from the fourth, fifth, and first half of the sixth centuries. The Basilica Julia in the Forum was restored by a praefectus urbi in 377, baths on the Aventine in 414, and the Baths of Constantine probably in about 443.18 In 328 a curator aquarum repaired the statio aquarum (office of the water-board) on the Forum, and part of the Aqua Marcia aqueduct was restored by a comes formarum at some date shortly before 468.19 Various praefecti in 365 built (or re­ built) a distribution tank [castellum) of the Aqua Claudia, in 381 repaired the Anio Novus aqueduct, and in 391/2 re-embellished a fountain.20 A long series of repairs by fifth-century praefecti to the Colosseum are recorded.212 Some official buildings of the Senate were added to and repaired in 393/4, 412/14, and at some date before 507 and in 507/18.22 Part of the praefectus ’s own seat was restored 17 C. Th. xiv. 6. 1-4 (359, 364, 365, and 382). 18 Basilica Julia: CIL vi. 1156b = ILS 5537; CIL vi. 1658a, b, c, and d; CIL vi. 31886 and 37105. Aventine baths: CIL vi. 1703 = ILS 5715. Baths of Constantine: CIL vi. 1750 = ILS 5703 (for the date: PLRE II, Quadratianus 2). 19 Statio aquarum: CIL vi. 36951 = ILS 8943. Marcia: CIL vi. 1765; see Chastagnol,Préfecture, 359 n. 1 and Ashby, 151-2. 20 Castellum: CIL vi. 3866 = 31963 = ILS 5791. Anio Novus: CIL vi. 3865 = 31945. Fountain: CIL vi. 1728a and b = 31912. 21 Chastagnol, Sénat, 5-14 and 41 ; CIL vi. 32090 (probably AD 425/37); CIL vi. 1763 = 32089 = IL S 5633 (AD 426/50); CIL vi. 32086-7 (AD 438); CIL vi. 32091 = ILS 5634 and CIL vi. 32092 (AD 470). 22 CIL vi. 1718 = IL S 5522 recording building in 393/4 and repair in 412/14 after a fire (perhaps during Alane’s sack of 410) in the Secretarium Senatus ; Variae ix. 7 of 527 referring to repair to the Curia by an earlier praefectus (see Della Valle, 144-53); A. Bartoli, ‘Lavori nella sede del senato romano al tempo di Teodorico*, Bullettino della Commissione archeologica del Comune di Rom a, 73 (1949-50), 77-88 for an inscription recording repair to the Atrium Libertatis by a praefectus urbi of 507/18.

Late Antique Rome

43

in 408/23.23 A portico near the theatre of Pompey was restored in the mid fifth century, and the Vicus Patricius embellished in the late fifth.24 On many statue-bases in Rome there are inscriptions with the names of late antique praefecti urbi, which record work that is generally left undefined under the blanket term curavit (‘he ordered to be done’); the datable examples stretch from 331 to Ostrogothic times.25 A few of these statue-bases carry more detailed inscriptions which explicitly refer to the re­ erection of statues, sometimes on new sites. For instance, in 377 a praefectus urbi ‘with due care repaired in one of the most frequented areas of the city a statue toppled by the accident of history \fatali necessitate] ’, and two fifth-century inscriptions refer to the re-erection of statues overturned by barbarians and civil war.26 In the light of these few detailed inscriptions it is almost certain that the many less explicit ones on statue-bases also record minor work of the same kind. What is less certain is the origin of the statues. Lanciani assumed that they were statues from the abandoned temples of the city, and cited Prudentius for a moderate Christian view that a statue of a pagan god should be appreciated for art’s sake: ‘Let the statues stand prized, the works of great craftsmen; let them become splendid ornaments to our native city.’27 Lanciani’s assumption may well be largely correct, and indeed one re-erected statue is described as an *image of Minerva’ (simulacrum Miner bae).28 However, not13 13 CIL vi. 31959 = 37114 = ILS 5523, and CIL vi. 31419 with Ann. Ep. (1941), no. 62. 24 Portico: A nn. Ep. (1948), no. 98 (for the date, not long before 467: PLRE H, Paulus 36). Vicus Patricius: CIL vi. 1775, fragmentary, and perhaps only a statue-dedication (for the date: PLRE II, Messala 4). 25 These are collected in CIL vi. 1651-72 and 31879-92. Late examples are: CIL vi. 1656a, b, and c of just before 476 (Chastagnol, Préfecture, 368); C/L vi. 1664 of 472/82 (PLRE H, Faüstus 4); CIL vi. 1665 = Fiebiger-Schmidt, no. 185, of the reign of Theodoric. A fragmentary inscription (CIL vi. 1795 = FiebigerSchmidt, no. 189) of Ostrogothic date on a lost statue-base, that once stood on the Via Sacra near the temple of Antoninus and Faustina, may well have been of this same kind. 26 377 inscriptions: CIL vi. 31883 and 31884 = ILS 9354 (for the date: PLRE I, Probianus 4). Fifth-century inscriptions: CIL vi. 1663 and 1664 (for the dates: PLRE II, Audax 3 and Faustus 4); see also p. 35 above. 27 R. Lanciani, The Destruction o f Ancient Rom e (New York, 1899), 35-6. Prudentius, Contra Sym m achum , i. lines 5 02-4 . 28 CIL vi. 1664.

44

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

only does it seem from some of the detailed inscriptions that in some cases fallen statues were being re-erected on the same site, but also the moving of statues from unsuitable sites is attested in the Empire before the official conversion to Christianity and well before the closure of the temples.29 It is, I think, very possible that many of the statues moved in Rome and elsewhere in Italy (see above, p. 32-3) came not only from temples, but also from other buildings falling into ruin. To finance major new work, such as the Baths of Constan­ tine, the city depended on imperial grants, which were super­ vised by the praefectus. Several major repairs were also carried out with special imperial or royal grants: in 312/24 Constan­ tine repaired the Aqua Virgo aqueduct, in 344/5 Constantius and Constans restored some baths (perhaps those of Agrippa), in 395/402 Arcadius and Honorius restored the theatre of Pompey, and in 398/9 Honorius repaired one of the Anio aqueducts with money captured in the campaign against Gildo.30 In the fifth century no such grants are recorded, but in Ostrogothic times Theodoric from his own treasury re­ funded Symmachus (descendant of the earlier praefectus urbi), who had restored the theatre of Pompey from his own pocket.3132 Symmachus’ repair to the theatre of Pompey (though later refunded by the state) is the last recorded case in Italy of private patronage of a traditional secular public building. Slightly earlier, in 484, a praefectus urbi repaired the Colosseum, again with his own money (sumptuproprio)?2 These two examples show that the traditions of private secular munificence survived in Rome a full hundred years longer than they can be documented elsewhere in the 29 Re-erection of statues: CIL vi. 1663 and 1664 (see above). For examples of earlier moving of statues to better sites: Pliny, £p. x. 8. 1 at Tifernum Tiberinum in the late first century; CIL viii. 5290 = ILS 5477 at Calama in Numidia ‘ex infrequenti et inculto loco in ista sede’ in the late third century (for the date: Chastagnol, Fastes, 22). 30 Virgo aqueduct: CIL vi. 31564; Baths: CIL vi. 1165; Platner-Ashby, 518. Theatre: CIL vi. 1191 = ILS 793. Anio aqueduct: CIL ix. 4051 = IL S 795. 31 Variae iv. 51 (see next note). 32 Theatre of Pompey: Variae iv. 51, ‘. . . expensas vobis de nostro cubiculo curavimus destinare, ut et vobis acquiratur tam boni operis fama et nostris tem­ poribus videatur antiquitas decentius innovata’. Colosseum: CIL vi. 1716a,b,and c = 32094a, b, and c = ILS 5635 (for the date: Chastagnol, Sénat, 44).

Late Antique Rome

45

peninsula.33 Similarly, we find in Rome evidence for the erection of statues of local and other worthies into the fifth century, when this practice had effectively died out in the rest of Italy.34 Despite such remarkable continuity of traditions in late antique Rome, many of the city’s buildings were, as we have seen, already in decay in the fourth century. With the problems of the fifth century this process was accelerated. No imperial repairs (after Honorius’ work on the walls) and few major ones by the praefecti are recorded, and there is also positive evidence of a worsening situation. In 440 Valentinian III, far from sending troops and money to help guard and repair Rome’s walls or ordering the praefectus to restore them from the funds available to him, commanded the people of the city to watch and repair them themselves.35 A law of Majorian of 458 attempted to halt the widespread tearing down of public buildings for the reuse of their materials (‘great buildings are ruined to carry out minor repairs’), but accepted that some buildings were beyond repair (‘what can evidently in no way be repaired’), and ordered that in these cases the materials should be transferred to other public buildings.36 In Ostrogothic 33 There are other possible examples of such munificence in fourth- and fifthcentury Rome. The basilica built by Junius Bassus, consul in 331 (PLRE I, Bassus 14), ‘propria impensa’ was almost certainly in origin a public building, though it had become private property when converted into a church in 468/83 (see p. 208 n. 13 below): CIL vi. 1737; Nash, i. 190-5. An inscription of c.400 and two of the mid fifth century refer to three different men as ‘conditori fori’: CIL vi. 1678 = 7LS 1281; CIL vi. 1662 = 31888 = IL S 5 3 5 7 ;CIL vi. 1198 = ILS 807/8. At this date this probably means they tidied up and beautified an existing square: CIL vi. 1197, which may refer to one of these fora, contains the phrase ‘squalore summ oto’. It is also possible that the later two did the work, not privately, but with public funds as praefecti urbi, a post both men had held (PLRE II, Maximus 22 and Epityncanus). This may also be the case with Naeratius Cerealis, praefectus urbi in 352/3 (PLRE I, Cerealis 2), referred to on several inscriptions as ‘conditori balnearum’: CIL vi. 1744 and 1744a = 31916 = ILS 5718; CIL vi. 1745 = ILS 1245. 34 I have not collected the evidence for Rome in Appendix 1. See Chastagnol, Préfecture y 363-8 for many of these statues. Late examples are: CIL vi. 1724 to Flavius Merobaudes in 435;C/L vi. 1725 = ILS 1284 to a praefectus urbi in 425/50 (PLRE II, Draucus); Sidonius Apollinaris, Carmen viii, lines 7-10, and Ep. ix, 16. 3, for a statue to himself in 455. Besides the force of tradition, another reason for statue-erection surviving longest in Rome may have been the continued good repair of much of the city’s secular monumental heart—the essential backdrop to the statues. 35 Leg. Nov. ad T h.y Nov. Val. v. 2-3 (440). 36 Leg. Nov. ad T h .y Maiorian iv ‘De aedificiis publicis’, addressed to the praefectus urbi.

46

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

times, as we shall see in Chapter 10, this expedient was carried further, with the alienation of public buildings free of charge to private individuals, reserving only precious materials to the State: of the three such grants recorded, two refer to buildings in Rome.37 Perhaps the most telling piece of evidence of all is an inscription, probably of around 433, recording repairs by the praefectus urbi to the baths of Constantine on the Quirinal.38 In it he specifically boasts of the small sum spent on the work, all that circumstances permitted: ‘he repaired . . . at small expense, which was as much as the scarcity of public funds would allow’. The situation may have improved slightly in Ostrogothic times, from which we have evidence of considerable royal interest in the city’s buildings, of payments (apparently mainly from the arca vinaria) into a general restoration fund, of the production of bricks, tiles, and mortar for the repair of the public buildings, and of one special royal grant for the restoration of a building.39 However, even in these years, there was no new building, and restoration was almost certainly restricted to a limited 37 Variae iii. 29 and iv. 30. 38 CIL vi. 1750 = IL S 5703 (for the date: PLRE II, Quadratianus 2). 39 Arca vinaria: Anon. Vales., c. 67 (p. 324): ‘et ad restaurationem palatii, seu ad recuperationem moeniae civitatis singulis annis libras ducentas de arca vinaria dari praecepit*. Fund for repair (its financing not specified): Cassiodorus, Chronica, 160; Variae i. 21 and ii. 34. Bricks and titles: Variae i. 25, granting 25,000 tiles a year from the royal kilns at Portus Licini; for brick-stamps of Theodoric and Athalaric CIL xv. 1663-75. Mortar: Variae vii. 17, the Formula de Praeposito Calcis. Special grant: Variae iv. 51, see p. 44 n. 32 above. The Ostrogothic docu­ ments raise in an acute form the problem of the word moenia. This is often trans­ lated as ‘city walls* (e.g. Harmand, 435). However, it is quite clear that in late antiquity it normally means ‘public buildings’ in general, as opposed to the specific muri (‘fortifications’): for this usage in the Theodosian Code see Janvier (op. cit. on p. 24 n. 26 above), 72-3. In an article Della Valle argued that Cas­ siodorus sometimes used moenia as a synonym for muri: G. Della Valle, ‘Moenia’, Rendiconti della Accademia di archeologia, lettere e belle arti, NS 33 (1958), 167-76. However, I do not think she proves her point. She does prove that moenia (public buildings) could, as we would expect, include muri (fortifications) within its meaning; but she does not prove that the word as used by Cassiodorus should ever be understood to mean exclusively and specifically ‘fortifications’, rather than *public buildings (perhaps including fortifications)’. Although I believe the Theo­ dosian Code and Cassiodorus make a distinction between moenia and m uri, other late antique authors clearly do not: on at least one occasion Maximus of Turin certainly uses moenia in the sense of ‘fortifications’ (quoted p. 193) and on another so does the poet Claudian (Claudian, De VI. Cons. H on., line 203).

Late Antique Rome

47

number of important buildings in central areas. We hear of the use and repair of the major entertainment buildings and of some of the statues and buildings of the Forum; but we hear nothing of many outlying monumental areas.40 At the end of the Ostrogothic period Procopius visited Rome, and his account of the city makes it clear how carefully some of its monuments had been tended, and yet how others of them had none the less suffered at the hands of time and neglect: ‘. . . the Romans love their city above all the men we know, and they are eager to protect all their ancestral treasures and to preserve them, so that nothing of the ancient glory of Rome may be obliterated. For even though they were for a long time under barbarian sway, they preserved the buildings of the city and most of its adornments, such as could through the excellence of their workmanship withstand so long a lapse of time and such neglect.’41 In theory the organization and funding to look after Rome’s buildings survived the Gothic Wars and the Byzantine conquest. The following officials (and reference to funds) appear in the Pragmatic Sanction of 554: For the preservation of public buildings. We have ordered that those customs and privileges of the city of Rome should be preserved that relate to the repair of public buildings, to the enbankment of the Tiber, to the Forum, to the port o f Rome, and to the repair o f the aqueducts: in such a way that these privileges are financed only from those funds from which they have traditionally been supported .4

Both a praefectus urbi and a supervisor of the aqueducts (presumably a comes formarum) are referred to in the time of Gregory the Great, and a curator palatii is known as late as 686.43 However, there is no evidence that the city received 40 Entertainment buildings: see Chapter 6 below. Forum: see above p. 39 n. 6, p. 42 n. 22, p. 43 n. 25 (also Chapter 10, section III). This impression of a wellmaintained heart of the city is confirmed by Procopius’ accounts of a wellpreserved temple of Janus in the Forum, and of statues by Myron, Pheidias, and Pysippus here and near by: Procopius, Gothic War, i. 25. 18-25 (Loeb edition, voi. iii,pp. 244-7) and iv. 2 1 .1 1 -1 4 (Loeb edition, voi. v, 274-5). 41 Procopius, Gothic War, iv. 22. 5-6 (Loeb edition, voi. v, p. 279). Procopius also refers to nettles growing in ruined buildings throughout the city, Gothic War iii. 1 7 .1 3 (Loeb edition,voi. iv,pp. 298-9). 42 Justinian, Novellae, 802, Appendix VII clause 25. 43 Praefectus urbi: Gregory, Ep. ix. 116-17. Comes formarum (in 602):'

48

The Decline o f Secular Munificence

adequate funds, either from local sources, which must have been further affected by the Gothic Wars, or from the imperial treasury. No inscriptions recording repairs by the praefectus urbi or his underlings are known after Ostrogothic times. In 602 Pope Gregory described the condition of Rome’s aqueducts as piteous, and possibly from as early as the pontificate of Honorius I (625-38) the responsibility for repairing one of them was assumed by the pope.44 Only two building-works by the secular administration are recorded in the later sixth and early seventh centuries: the rebuilding of the Ponte Salaria in 565, after damage in the wars, and the dedication of a column and statue in the Forum to Phocas in 608.45 Both were the work of Byzantine governors of Italy, Narses and Smaragdus, and in neither case is any mention made of the traditional officials responsible for Rome’s buildings. In the organization of its public buildings Rome had finally sunk to the level of a provincial town. Gregory, Ep. xii. 6. Curator palatii: De Rossi, Inseri. Christ, ii. 442 n. 152; Lib. Pont., i. 371 and 377-8 nn. 11 and 12. 44 Gregory, Ep. xii. 6. Honorius: Lib. Pont. i. 324; see p. 250 below. 45 Ponte Salaria: CIL vi. 1199 =ILS 832 = Fiebiger-Schmidt, no. 217. Column of Phocas: CIL vi. 1200 = IL S 837; Platner-Ashby, 133-4; Nash, i. 280-1.

PART II THE RISE OF CHRISTIAN PATRONAGE

The aim of this section of the book is to examine in some detail the main effects of the conversion to Christianity on the pattern of public building. The section is divided into four chapters, the first and last, broadly, dealing with positive effects, and the middle two with negative. In Chapter 4 I shall look at the wholly new buildings of the new religion, the churches, and examine to what extent building in this field satisfied not only spiritual but also secular needs, and provided a satisfactory alternative for the moribund traditions of classical secular patronage. In Chapter 5 I turn to the other side of the coin and the end of the patronage of the pagan temples. In Chapter 6 I shall look at the buildings of secular enter­ tainment, which were also strongly attacked by the Fathers of the Church, and see whether here too it was their strictures that eventually closed them. Finally, in Chapter 7 I shall examine the aqueducts and baths, where the effect of the conversion was not to destroy, but radically to alter, the older traditions of patronage.

4

Churches In my first three chapters I set out the melancholy story of the decline and fall of traditional classical patronage. I shall now turn to the more cheerful side of the picture: the rise of a new patronage of churches and other related buildings. I intend in a first section to give an impression of the extent of church-building in central and northern Italy between about 300 and 850, and an idea of how this affected the appearance of towns. Because there is a huge literature avail­ able on surviving, excavated, and documented churches, this treatment will necessarily be rather limited. In a second section, I shall examine the pattern of patronage behind all this activity, above all in relation to that of the traditional secular monuments. Here I wish to explore two particular possibilities: firstly, that Christianity destroyed traditional secular patronage, by seizing all the available money for building, and, secondly, that church-building (even if it did not destroy traditional patronage) provided a very satisfactory replacement for it.I I

In an appendix at the end of the book (Appendix 2) I have set out the considerable evidence available for church-building and church-decoration in the period c.300 to c.850 in the four towns of our area of Italy best documented in this respect: Rome, Ravenna, Pavia, and Lucca. As is clear from this appendix, there is good evidence from Rome and Ravenna of patronage throughout our period by all propertied classes: popes, bishops, emperors, kings, government officials, and local aristocrats (both clerics and laymen). From Pavia and Lucca the evidence starts rather later, but is almost as dense and varied.

52

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

Three of these towns, Rome and Ravenna, and Pavia, were by no means typical, since they were ecclesiastical or secular capitals, which made them the focus of court patronage and also ensured that their bishops and citizens were rich. This undoubtedly led to the building of structures of an excep­ tional size and splendour, such as old St. Peter’s and S. Maria Maggiore in Rome and S. Apollinare Nuovo and S. Vitale in Ravenna. Indeed, another major capital of our period, Milan, also has a magnificent set of large churches of that time (the fourth century) when it served as an imperial residence, though in Milan the documentary and epigraphic sources are so poor that we do not know how much of this building was through the patronage of the court.1 However, our fourth well-documented town, Lucca, was a much more ordinary provincial centre: the seat of an impor­ tant, but not exceptional dukedom and bishopric. Yet here, in the eighth century at least, the building activity and charit­ able endowment was just as frenetic as in the three capitals. The only differences are in the scale of individual buildings, in the absence of imperial or royal patronage, and in the scarcity of the patronage of court officials. Fortunately, there is just enough evidence elsewhere in Italy to show firstly that the considerable patronage of buildings in early medieval Lucca was not exceptional, and secondly that such activity was also widespread in provincial centres in the late antique period, not covered by the Lucca charters. The late fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries are repre­ sented by sizeable excavated or standing churches in a large number of towns (some of them relatively minor centres): Porec (Parenzo), Trieste, Aquileia, Grado, Concordia, Ancona, Vicenza, Verona, Brescia, Castelseprio, Vercelli, Albenga, Luna, Florence, Perugia, Spoleto, Nola, S. Maria di Capua Vetere, Nocera Inferiore, and Naples.2 In some cases we have evidence of who paid for these and other, lost, buildings, and 1 Milan churches: Storia di Milano, i. 595-625; G. Traversari, Architettura paleocristiana milanese (Milan, 1964); A. Calderini et al., La basilica di S. Lorenzo Maggiore a Milano (Milan, 1951). 2 This list is certainly far from complete now, and will also be added to in the future by excavation. For some idea of Italy’s churches in late antiquity: R. Krautheimer, Early Christian and Byzantine Architecture, (revised Penguin paper­ back edition, 1975), 82-9, 9 1-6, 179-98, and 290-5.

Churches

53

this evidence shows a range of patrons as broad as that of the Lucca charters. At Aquileiaa fourth- or fifth-century governor of Venetia et Histria dedicated something to the Holy Apostles (perhaps a building), and at Padova a court official built a church of S. Giustina in the early sixth century.3 At Aquileia, Grado, and Pore£ the patronage of a number of fifth- and sixth-century bishops is well recorded in narrative and epigraphic sources, and from fifth- and sixth-century Milan (after it had ceased to be a regular imperial residence) we know of extensive building activity by two bishops.4 The patronage of the lesser secular and ecclesiastical aristocracy in northern Italy in the fifth and sixth centuries is particularly well documented through the custom of donating a certain number of square feet of mosaic towards a church’s floor and of carefully recording this on the floor in a mosaic inscription. Inscriptions of this kind, listing a large number of local donors (both ecclesiastics and laymen), have survived at Poreò, Trieste, Grado, Aquileia, Concordia, Ravenna, Vicenza, Verona, Brescia, and Florence.5 It is difficult to document much patronage in the seventh century outside Rome, Ravenna, and Pavia; but as soon as written documentation becomes relatively abundant, in the eighth century, we have enough evidence for the foundation 3 Aquileia: CIL v. 1582 (for the date: PLRE I, Appollinaris 5). Padova (Patavium); CIL v. 3100 = ILS 1297 = IL C V 1803 (for the date: PLRE II, Opilio 5). 4 Porec: B. Molajoli,La basilica eufrasiana d iParenzo (Padova, 1943). Aquileia and Grado: S. Tavano, Aquileia Cristiana (Udine, 1972) (= Antichità Altoadria­ tichey iii); G. Brusin and P. L. Zovatto, M onum enti paleocristiani di Aquileia e Grado (Udine, 1957). Bishop Eusebius of Milan: CIL v. p. 617 no. 1 = ILC V 1802 = De Rossi, Inscr. Christ. ii. 161 no. 1 (a rebuilding of S. Tecla, after a fire, very possibly in the sack of 452 by Attila). Bishop Laurentius of Milan: Ennodius, Epigr. 183, 181, and 96, referring to restorations of S. Calimero and S. Giovanni al Fonte, and the building of the chapel of S. Sisto (by S. Lorenzo Maggiore); also Epigr. 97 referring to a church of uncertain identification. 5 Again, this does not pretend to be a complete list. Porec: CIL v. 365-7. Trieste: G. Cuscito, ‘Le epigrafi musive della basilica martiriale di Trieste*, Aquileia Nostra, 44 (1973), 128-56. Grado: CIL v. 1583-1616;Vo*. Scavi (1928), 287-92. Aquileia: see works cited in preceding note. Concordia: G. Bovini, Concordia paleocristiana (Bologna, 1973); G. Brusin and P. L. Zovatto, M onum enti romani e cristiani di Iulia Concordia (Pordenone, 1960). Vicenza: G. Lorenzon, TI gruppo paleocristiano dei Santi Felice e Fortunato in Vicenza’, A tti del 1° Congresso Nazionale di Archeologia Cristiana (1950), 207-15. Verona: CIL v. 3893-5. Brescia: CIL v. 4841. Florence: G. Morozzi, F. Toker, and J. Hermann, S. Reparata, Vantica cattedrale fiorentina. I risultati dello scavo condotto dal 1965 al 1974 (Florence, 1974), 29-30 and figs. 32-4.

54

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

of churches, monasteries, and charitable hostels (xenodochia) in a large number of towns, to show quite conclusively that early medieval Lucca is an exception only in the amount of evidence that survives from it. This can best be illustrated by listing the evidence for church-building (inside and outside towns) by one particular category of patron: the Lombard local governors, the dukes and gastalds. One of these was active in Lucca, where he built a monastery in c. 783 (see Appendix 2.D). In the great independent duchy of Benevento, Theuderata, wife of Duke Romuald, built the monastery of S. Pietro outside Benevento in the 680s, and, inside the town, a century later Duke Arechis II (758-87) built the church of S. Sophia, which still stands today.6 At Salerno, the same Arechis built a church of SS. Pietro e Paolo.7 From the duchy of Spoleto there is less evidence, but an inscription from an altar or altar-screen survives in the abbey of S. Pietro at Ferentillo, recording its gift by Duke Hilderic and his wife Dagileopa in c.739, and in 751 another duke of Spoleto, Lupo, and his wife Ermelinda, founded the monastery of S. Giorgio near Rieti.8 At Chiusi, the local duke, Gregory, with his wife Austrecunda, replaced the wooden ciborium of S. Mustiola with one of marble in 729, and at Volterra in 688/700 the gastald, Alchis, dedicated an altar to S. Giusto.9 Outside Siena, one gastald, Warnefred, built and endowed a monastery in 730, and a second gastald, Gauspert, erected an altar of S. Amsano in the territory of the town in 749/52.10 In Vicenza the gastald, Radoald, gave a font to the cathedral in the late seventh or early eighth century, and in Cividale before 744 Duke Ratchis (later king of the Lombards) 6 S. Pietro: Hist. Lang. vi. 1. S. Sophia: Erchempert, 236. The identification of this as a palace-chapel (Belting, 175-93) is certainly erroneous: see Delogu, 23-33, and Rotili, 212-17 (also for the surviving remains). 7 Chron. Sal. 17 (p. 22). Paulus Diaconus, Gedichte, 18 for a fragment of verse perhaps written for the church by Paul the Deacon. In general and for possible remains: Delogu, 45-50. 8 Ferentillo: E. Herzig, ‘Die langobardischen Fragmente in der Abtei S. Pietro in Ferentillo (Umbrien)’, Römische Quartalschrift fü r christliche Altertum skunde und fü r Kirchengeschichte, 20 (1906), 49-81 (for the donors: Jamut, 393). S. Giorgio: Jamut, 396-7 n. xii. 9 Chiusi: Jamut, 3 5 7 -9 no. lxvi; Troya, CDL iii. 545 no. 485. Volterra: Troya, CDL iii. 49 no. 367;Jarnut, 339 no. xiii. 10 Warnefred: Schiaparelli, CDL no. 50. Gauspert: Troya, CDL iii no. 661; Jamut, 353 no. lvii.

Churches

55

provided an elaborately carved altar in the church of S. Giovanni.11 All this activity greatly altered the monumental appear­ ance of Italy’s towns. The late antique period in particular was marked by the building of very large churches indeed, not only in Rome, Milan, and Ravenna, but also in lesser centres where excavation has revealed imposing late antique cathedrals. That at Florence, for instance, was over 60 m long.12 These early churches were either built inside the towns, as cathedrals or lesser centres of worship, or outside over the graves of the martyrs (buried in the Roman cemeteries).13 Examples of the former type of church are S. Giovanni in Laterano, S. Maria Maggiore, S. Sabina, and S. Pietro in Vincoli in Rome, the orthodox and Arian cathedrals, S. Vitale, S. Michele in Africisco, S. Giovanni Evangelista, S. Croce, and S. Apollinare Nuovo at Ravenna, and the excavated cathedrals of Florence, Luna, Milan, and Verona. Examples of cemeterychurches are all those that ringed Milan, Verona, and Rome, and churches like S. Apollinare in Classe at Ravenna. Both these types of late antique church were maintained and added to in the early Middle Ages (after c.550). In Rome, for instance, the greatest cemetery-church of all Italy, St. Peter’s, was constantly repaired and embellished, and two other cemetery-churches, S. Lorenzo and S. Agnese fuori-lemura, were rebuilt in 579/90 and 625/38. The intramural churches were also maintained and occasionally rebuilt or added to (particularly in the ninth century). At the very end of our period, in around 800, there was a shift in emphasis in favour of churches in the built-up area, through the new habit of translating relics from their original resting-places into the town. In Rome, Paschal I moved a large number of saintly 11 Vicenza: Jamut, 365 no. lxxxix. Cividale: Jamut, 366 no. xciv; N. Gray, ‘The Paleography of Latin Inscriptions in the Eighth, Ninth and Tenth Centuries in Italy’, Papers o f the British School at Rom e, 16 (1948), 66 no. 27. 12 See G. Morozzi et al., op. cit. (p. 53 n. 5 above). 13 I am avoiding the debated problem of whether cathedrals were generally in origin intramural or extramural, since this can only be tackled through very detailed local studies. On this see C., Violante and C. D. Fonseca, ‘Ubicazione e dedicazione delle cattedrali dalle origini al periodo romanico nelle città dell’Italia centro-settentrionale’, A tti del 1° Convegno di Studi medioevali di Storia e d ’A rte, Pistoia 1964 (Pistoia, 1966), 303-46.

56

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

bodies into his rebuilt intramural churches of S. Cecilia, S. Maria in Domnica, and S. Prassede, and in Lucca, Bishop John in the late eighth century translated the body of S. Regolo into the cathedral from near Populonia.14 However, this did not lead to the eclipse of the established cemetery-churches, since these generally contained much better corpses than those available for translation, and jealously held on to them. Hence St. Peter’s and all the great cemetery-churches round Rome never lost their importance; nor did S. Zeno outside Verona, S. Frediano outside Lucca, and S. Apollinare in Classe outside Ravenna (despite a temporary sojourn of the martyr’s bones inside the city, and a consequent centurieslong dispute over the true resting-place of the relics, between S. Apollinare in Classe and his intramural shrine, renamed S. Apollinare Nuovo in the saint’s honour).15 However, the most common early medieval foundation was not a cemetery-church nor a large intramural hall of wor­ ship, but a small foundation within the built-up area, with a church (or chapel) associated generally with a small private monastery or with a charitable institution, in Lombard Italy called a xenodochium,.16 This type of foundation appears particularly clearly in the aristocratic Lucca charters. It is much less clear in the Ravenna, Rome, and Pavia evidence, since popes, archbishops, bishops, and kings concentrated to some extent on larger and more public foundations. However, in all three towns there is a limited amount of evidence to 14 For church-building in Rome and Lucca, see Appendix 2 A and D. ls S. Apollinare: G. Bovini, ‘L’antica abside e la cripta di S. Apollinare Nuovo in Ravenna’, Felix Ravenna, ser. 3, 3 (1950), 14-30. 16 These charitable institutions first appear in late antiquity; the earliest recorded in the West are the nosocomium of Fabiola in Rome and the xenodochium of Pammachius at Ostia (see Appendix 2A): see H. Leclercq, ‘Hôpitaux, Hospices, Hôtelleries’, Dictionnaire d*Archéologie Chrétienne, vi.cols. 2748-70. In Lombard Italy these institutions are always referred to as xenodochia, which strictly means a hostel for strangers; but it is quite clear from the detailed provisions set out in the foundation-charters of some of them that they were intended to minister to any of the poor and destitute. The only specialized institution in the Lombard area of Italy in our period that I know of is the foundlings’ hospital of S. Salvatore Dateo, founded in Milan in 787: V. Forcella, Iscrizioni delle Chiese . . . di Milano, i. 77 no. 105 and 199 no. 193. In Greek-influenced Rome and Ravenna a more specialized vocabulary and a greater specialization of function (in line with Eastern practice) can be found: e.g. Lib. P ont. i. 397 for an old-age hostel (gerocomium) in Rome in 715/31, and Appendix 2B ‘Ursicinus’ and Tohanicis* for an orphano­ trophium and gerocom ium , both at Ravenna.

Churches

57

suggest that the local aristocracy may have been behaving very much as that of Lucca, and indeed in Rome many of the popes too not only repaired and added to the great centres of worship, but also established small monasteries in their homes and set up charitable institutions to feed the poor (the Roman diaconiae).17 The differences in the general pattern of church foundation between late antique and early medieval Italy are clear in towns where we have information for both periods. In Milan, for instance, the will of Archbishop Aribert of 1034 lists many of the churches of the city at this date: . . . to the churches of S. Ambrogio where his body lies, of S. Vittore also called ‘a d C o r p u s ’, of S. Martino, of S. Vincenzo, o f S. Naborre, of S. Simpliciano, o f S. Eustorgio, of S. Lorenzo, of S. Celso, of S. Nazaro, of S. Stefano, and of S. Dionigi. And, within the city, to the churches of S. Maria, blessed Mother of God, which is called the winter-church [ Y e m a le ] , and SS. Tecla and Pelagia, which is called the summer-church [ E s t i v a ] , and of S. Giorgio martyr of Christ. Also to all the nunneries that are built within the city, which are by name: the ‘Monastero Maggiore’, that of S. Salvatore called ‘of Wuidelinda’, a third called ‘o f Aurona’, a fourth ‘of Datheus’, a fifth ‘of Lantasius’, a sixth the ‘Mon­ astero Nuovo’, a seventh ‘of Ghiso’ . . .18

Of this list a first group consists of extramural cemeterychurches, followed by the double cathedral of S. Maria and S. Tecla. Most of these churches have been proved, through study of their surviving remains or through excavation, to have been late antique in date and often very large.19 A second group consists of intramural female monasteries. In this case the original churches have largely disappeared with­ out trace, and they must have been very small, but their names prove conclusively that they were mainly, or even entirely, the work of early medieval founders.20 In Verona the pattern was probably very similar, though we do not know for certain how many of the churches were late antique in origin; however, most of the long list of cemetery-churches described as ringing the city in the Versus de Verona of 17 On diaconiae: O. Bertolini, ‘Per la storia dell diaconie romane’, Archivio della Società romana di Storia patria, 70 (1947), 1-145. '* C. Manaresi and C. Santoro, eds., Gli atti privati milanesi e comaschi del secolo X I, ii (Milan, 1960), no. 218. 19 See p. 52 n. 1 above. ì# For early medieval churches in and around Milan: Storia di Milano, ii. 500-608.

58

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

c. 790/806 were probably of this date, as was the intramural cathedral, whereas several monasteries and xenodochia known inside the built-up area of Verona were certainly early medieval.21 A striking characteristic of early medieval, as opposed to late antique, churches is their small size (which has meant that very few of them survive today, since they have normally almost entirely disappeared in rebuilding; whereas the more imposing late antique churches are often still standing, or have proved hard to miss in excavation). This decrease in size was certainly in part due to changes in function: the chapels of small monasteries and xenodochia did not need to be large. However, it is also true that churches apparently designed to serve similar ends to those of the large churches of late antiquity were in general small. In Rome the late sixth- and early seventh-century cemetery-churches of S. Lorenzo and S. Agnese are about 30 m long and were wholly dwarfed by the huge Constantinian basilicas near by (about 100 m long).22 Most early medieval papal churches were built as halls of public worship, very much as in late antiquity; yet after the huge churches of S. Maria Maggiore of 432/40 (c.75 m long) and S. Stefano Rotondo of 468/83 (c.65 m in diameter) churches were either very small or consisted of adapted classical buildings (such as the Pantheon) until the end of the eighth century, with the single exception of the 55-metre-long S. Pancrazio of 625/38.23 Indeed, for a limited period, after the pontificate of Honorius I (625-38) and before that of Gregory II (715-31), although the Liber Pontificalis continues to list papal building, what is recorded is all on a tiny scale (see Appendix 2A). In the ninth century papal churches were larger: S. Cecilia, S. Maria in Domnica, and S. Prassede, all of 817/24, S. Marco of 827/44, S. Maria Nova (S. Francesca Romana) and SS. Quattro Coronati, both of 847/55, ranged between c.35 and c.55 m in length. These dimensions are comparable to some fifth-century churches, 21 For churches in and around Verona: Verona e il suo territorio, i. 562-91, ii. 481-7. 22 I have derived all my information on the size of Roman churches from Krautheimer, Corpus. 23 For S. Pancrazio and its exceptional size: Krautheimer, Corpus, ili. 155 and 173-4.

Churches

59

like S. Pietro in Vincoli (c.60 m long) and S. Sabina (c. 55 m), but do not match the scale of S. Maria Maggiore, S. Stefano Rotondo, or the fourth-century imperial buildings, such as S. Paolo fuori-le-mura, St. Peter’s, and S. Giovanni in Laterano (all over 100 m long). Outside Rome the evidence is much less complete; but in Ravenna it is clear from Agnellus that there was no really major building after S. Severo in 570/95. In Pavia and Milan the only churches of our period whose size is known, S. Maria in Pertica and S. Maria di Aurona, were very small indeed compared with the late antique churches of the latter town. At Castelseprio we have the tiny, if beautifully frescoed, church of S. Maria foris portas, also dwarfed by a nearby late antique basilica (S. Giovanni), and at Brescia the Desiderian monastic church of S. Salvatore seems to have been only 28 m long (replaced in Carolingian times by the present church, 40 m long).24 There are various possible explanations for this shrinkage of scale, but most can be dismissed on examination. Firstly, as we have seen, a change of function will serve only as an explanation of the small size of monastic Eigenkirche, but will not serve in cases like many of the papal and Lombard royal foundations. Secondly, it seems very unlikely that all patrons in the early Middle Ages spent proportionately less of their income on building than at an earlier date. In the case of the popes, for whom we are particularly well in­ formed, some, like Gregory the Great, were obviously not zealous builders, but others, like Honorius I (625-38) and John VII (705-7), evidently were, and, for instance, in the case of John’s tiny oratory of S. Maria in St. Peter’s we are told that this cost a considerable sum by contemporary standards: ‘. . . he spent a large sum of gold and silver.’25 24 For the churches of Lombard northern Italy: Melucco Vaccaro, 136-61; A. Arslan in Storia di Milano, ii. 501-602; A. Peroni, ‘Architettura e decorazione nell’età longobarda alla luce dei ritrovamenti lombardi*, A tti del Convegno Inter­ nazionale sul tema: la Civiltà dei Longobardi in Europa (Roma e Cividale 1971) (Rome, 1974) (= Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, quaderno no. 189), 331-60. For S. Salvatore: Storia di Brescia, i. 521-32 (the identification and dating of the two churches depends largely on an excavation whose results are put in doubt by poor technique). For the churches of the Lombard South: Rotili. 25 Lib. Pont. i. 385.

60

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

Thirdly, loss of the technical skills needed to build big is highly improbable, since in Rome, as we shall see, the evi­ dence of repair to the roofs of St. Peter’s and other massive early churches shows that one of the most difficult feats (the spanning of large gaps with roof-timbers) was always possible. A fourth explanation, a change of aesthetic values away from large-scale building to small, is more difficult to prove or disprove. It is a very distinct possibility, since small size is a feature of Eastern Byzantine architecture between the sixth and twelfth centuries, even in prosperous centres. However, in the West the argument of aesthetic change is, I think, less powerful. There is no doubt that size was appreciated, at least until the mid sixth century (witness S. Vitale), and there is also good evidence to show that it was widely appreciated in the ninth century. Agnellus of Ravenna in the first half of the ninth century frequently referred admiringly to the large scale of the late antique churches of his city, and in Rome both ninth-century papal biographers and the inscriptions placed in the apses of churches often refer not only to the sumptuousness, but also to the large size of the new building: ‘This large church’, ‘of wonderful size and beauty’, ‘he enlarged the building’, and ‘building from the foundations, he renewed it to a larger and better state than before’.26 For the intermediate period, betweenc.550 and c.800, when churches were particularly small, it is difficult to find reliable evidence on attitudes to size. In this period descriptions of churches and inscriptions in them stress, as before and after, beauty, light, and sumptuousness, but do not refer to scale (either smallness or largeness). However, this silence may well reflect not a change of aesthetic values but a glossing over of an awkward reality. Indeed, two small pieces of evidence suggest that, at least around 600, size was still appreciated, even if rarely attained. Firstly, the conversion of the huge Pantheon into a church by Boniface IV (608-15) definitely suggests that size still counted, though it was not matched in contemporary building. Secondly, the mosaic inscription set up in Pelagius II’s 26 Inscription in S..Cecilia: Lib. Pont. ii. 66 n. 22. Description of SS. Nereo ed Achilleo: Lib. Pont. ii. 33. Inscription in S. Susanna: Lib. Pont. ii. 3. Description of S. Maria in Domnica: Lib. Pont. ii. 55. It should be noted that SS. Nereo ed Achilleo, as rebuilt, was still a small building (c.30 m long).

Churches

61

(579-90) church of S. Lorenzo fuori-le-mura praises not only the greater light of the new building over the earlier shrine, but also its greater size (the ‘narrow approaches’ have been transformed into a ‘larger hall’); yet Pelagius’ church, though a fine building, is also a very small one measuring only 30 m in length.27 Because all other explanations seem flawed or partial, I think we must conclude that the main reason for the fluctu­ ations in the size of churches is probably the simple one that patrons had in general less spare cash for building between the later sixth and the early ninth centuries than before or after, and that even in the ninth century (for which most of the evidence comes from Rome) the money available for churches was less than in late antiquity. However, if we accept, as we must, that the early Middle Ages was a time of tight patronage and not one of history’s great periods for building, the picture should not be painted too dark. Surviving or recorded buildings even from the seventh and eighth centuries, like Pelagius’ S. Lorenzo and John VII’s oratory of S. Maria, both in Rome, or the frescoed S. Maria foris portas at Castelseprio and stuccoed S. Maria in Valle at Cividale, both in Lombard Italy, were all beautifully and lavishly decorated, if tiny. It is quite clear that a con­ tinuous and developing tradition of architecture and decora­ tion survived not only in the Byzantine areas of Italy, but also in those areas under the Lombards, open to foreign influence but not dependent on it.28 Equally it is important to realize that, even in periods when little new building occurred, the old was carefully and successfully maintained. The huge late antique churches built all over Italy were not replaced in this period (this process began only in the eleventh century), but nor were they allowed to fall into ruin; nor indeed did those massive classical monuments adapted to use as churches, like the Pantheon or the Curia in Rome, decay. Information from Rome gives us a powerful impression of the constant and large-scale 17 De Rossi, Inscr. Christ, ii. 63-4 no. 10, 106 no. 46, and 157 no. 7 = IL C V 1770. ** See Arslan and Peroni (cited on p. 59 n. 24 above) for Lombard North Italy; Krautheimer, R om e for Rome; Rotili for Lombard South Italy.

62

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

maintenance work that such repair involved. There is evidence of this in the Liber Pontificalis for a great many churches (particularly from the early eighth century onwards), but we have the most complete picture in the case of St. Peter’s: the church was repaired by Leo I (440-61); part of its roof was replaced by Gregory the Great; sixteen new beams were added by Honorius I (625-38), who also partially covered the building in classical bronze tiles; its apse-mosaic was restored by Severinus (640); it was restored by Benedict I (684-5); the mosaic on the façade and part of the roof were repaired by Sergius (687-701); its marble paving and fourteen beams of the roof were replaced by Hadrian I (772-95), who for the roof received from Charlemagne help obtaining the timbers, a technical advisor (Walcharius Archbishop of Sens), and a gift of 200 lb of lead; the roof was also repaired by Leo III (795-816), Leo IV (847-55), and Benedict II (855-8).29 The Liber Pontificalis generally gives us an impression of smoothly operated and timely repair work, even if on a large scale. Slightly later than our period we have more explicit evidence of what a serious headache for the papacy the upkeep of these ancient buildings presented. In 896 the roof of S. Giovanni in Laterano collapsed ‘from the altar all the way to the doors’, and in 964 the leaking roofs of Rome’s churches were brought to testify against John XII: The churches of the holy apostles bear witness, which let in not drops of rain, but water through the whole roof, even on to the holy altars . . . Death rules in these buildings, and prevents those of us who dearly wish to from praying, and drives us rapidly from the Lord’s house .30

Outside Rome the documentary evidence is scarce, but the survival of so many large paleochristian buildings until the Romanesque period or later is in itself adequate testimony to 29 Leo I: Lib. Pont. i. 2S9; Gregory: Ep. ix. 126; Honorius: Lib. Pont. i. 32S; Severinus: Lib. Pont i. 329. Benedict I: Lib. Pont. i. 363. Sergius: Lib. Pont. i. 375. Hadrian I: Lib. Pont. i. 503 and 505, and Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Epistolae, IH. 592-3 and 609-10. Leo III: Lib. Pont. ii. 1. Leo IV: Lib. Pont. ii. 127. Benedict II: Lib. Pont. ii. 146. The huge timbers needed to span St. Peter’s (and also S. Paolo and S. Giovanni) came in Gregory the Great’s time from southern Italy; under Hadrian I and in the tenth century they came from the central Italian Apennines (see Toubert, 642 and n. 2). 30 896: Lib. Pont. ii. 229. 964: Liudprand, De rebus gestis Ottonis, 4.

Churches

63

constant and satisfactory maintenance. It is an easy mistake to slip into to assume that a building will stand up until it is de­ molished; for in fact it will fall down fairly rapidly. The sur­ vival of a large palaeochristian church throughout our period, as for instance S. Reparata in Florence, testifies not to passive acceptance of the building but to active effort and appreci­ ation.31 Most of this repair work was probably paid for privately by donors, or out of ecclesiastical revenue set aside for building (see below). However, a series of Italian capitu­ laries of the Carolingians, issued in the late eighth and early ninth centuries, refer to an old custom in the Lombard king­ dom of repair, of at least baptismal churches, as a public duty, requiring contributions of money or labour when necessary.32 It is possible that the Liber Pontificalis was referring to something similar when it complained of the ‘depredation of churches and people’ necessary for Sergius II’s rebuilding of S. Martino (844-7).33 Like other such services (to bridges and walls), these duties almost certainly were inherited from late antiquity, when indeed we do find references to a common duty ‘to build and repair public or sacred buildings’.34 The effect of all this building and repair work was obviously to provide and maintain a wholly new set of public monu­ ments in a period when the traditional secular buildings were being abandoned. One interesting side line of this change of emphasis was the tendency of the churches to attract to them some of the monumental paraphernalia that once surrounded secular public monuments, particularly in the fora. A number of churches were provided with suitably splendid approaches in the form of porticoed roads: in Rome these are attested leading to St. Peter’s, S. Paolo, and S. Lorenzo; in Milan part of the portico outside S. Lorenzo still survives; and in Lucca porticalia are recorded around the cathedral in the ninth century.35 In the case of the great church of St. Peter’s outside Rome 31 S. Reparata: see p. 53 n. 5 above. 32 Capit, i. 191 no. 91 cl. 1 ; 196. no. 93 cl. 3 (‘et singulis prout eius possibilitas fuerit restaurandi, mensura deputetur’);» . 64 no. 202 cl. 9. 33 Lib. Pont. ii. 97-8. 34 C. Th. xi. 16. 15 (382) or 18 (390). 3S Lucca: first reference in Bars. no. 519 (of 833).

64

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

a whole new ‘city’ of monuments and clerical establishments grew up around the shrine (in classical times an area of graves and gardens), in the very period that the traditional monu­ mental heart of the city, the Forum, was gradually being abandoned or transformed (see Chapter 10, section ill).36 The great church itself (almost 250 m long, including its atrium and preceding steps) was built by Constantine to replace a tiny cemetery-shrine; in 366/84 Pope Damasus drained the marshy area around it and built a baptistery, in 390/410 the widow of Sextus Petronius Probus erected his mausoleum behind the apse, and in c.400 Honorius built a large mausoleum for himself and his family beside the church.37 At some date before the Gothic War, the church was linked to the Pons Aelius by a monumental portico, and in 379/83 and in 405 arches were erected over the approaches to the Pons Neronianus and the Pons Aelius which linked the Vatican to the old city (in the case of the latter bridge a further portico was added leading from it into the heart of the city). The portico from the Pons Aelius to the church was carefully maintained: it was given a major restoration by Hadrian I (772-95), who at the point where it met the river also embanked the Tiber with 12,000 blocks of tufa in order to create a broader and safer access for the crowds of pilgrims. In the pontificate of Paschal I (817-24) the portico was damaged in a fire and subsequently repaired. During the pontificate of Symmachus (498-514), when the Lateran was occupied by an antipope, two palaces {episcopia) were built by St. Peter’s, and Leo III (795-815) later also built a papal residence (with banqueting-hall). In the ninth century appears a palace by the church used by the Carolingian kings and emperors on their visits to Rome.38 In 440/61 the first subsidiary church by St. Peter’s, a monastery, is recorded, and by the end of the eighth century the whole area around the basilica and between it and the river was filled with small churches with attached monasteries, diaconiae, and xenodochia, in order to minister to the pilgrims and poor who flocked to the shrine. This area also contained 36 For what follows see Reekmans. 37 For the mausoleum of Honorius see also Krautheimer, Corpus, v. 180. 38 For these various places see Chapter 8 below.

Churches

65

the scholae (hostels) of the foreign pilgrims: Anglo-Saxons, Frisians, Lombards, and Franks. Finally, after the disastrous Saracen raid of 846, this new ‘city’ was completed by the building of a wall to surround it and by its naming as the ‘Civitas Leoniana’. II

The fact that extensive and continuous ecclesiastical patron­ age, by all classes of propertied society, flourished in the towns of Italy from at least the end of the fourth century might seem an obvious cause for the great decline of patron­ age of secular buildings documented in late antiquity. How­ ever, a closer examination of the people and dates involved in both the old and the new patronage shows that the connection between the decline of one and the rise of the other was not often so tight. In one important way the establishment of the Church in the fourth century must have had an immediate and detri­ mental effect on secular patronage. The Church’s endowment with rich properties and its recruitment into its own ranks of aristocrats, like Paulinus of Noia and Ambrose, obviously meant that one part of the landed wealth of Italy was removed from the general fund of potential patronage of secular buildings into a separate category of patronage of ecclesi­ astical and charity buildings only. In the case of rich sees, the size of the Church’s endowment rapidly became very large indeed. In Rome, through the Liber Pontificalis, we know of Constantine’s massive gifts to the papacy, and in Ravenna we know that by the sixth century the annual income of the see was 12,000 solidi, excluding income in kind.39 By the late fifth century, if not before, it was traditional in Italy for a quarter of this income to be put into the Church’s own buildings, probably mainly for upkeep and repair, but almost certainly in part for new building.40 39 Llewellyn, 138-9; Richards, 296-7 ;Jones, LRE> 904-5. 40 A. Thiel, ed., Epistolae romanorum pontificum genuinae (Brunsberg, 1868), Gelasius, Ep. 14. 27 and 16. 2 (pp. 378 and 381); Gregory, Ep. xi. 56a. For the pressure on bishops to build, due to their great wealth: P. Brown, The Cult o f the Holy (London, 1981), 39-40.

66 The Rise o f Christian Patronage With the help of this endowed wealth, supplemented by special gifts for building and by contributions from the private fortunes of bishops and archbishops, a rich see could afford to construct one ecclesiastical building after another (see Appendix 2.A and B). Already in the late fourth and early fifth centuries we have evidence that the papacy in Rome was only able to keep up with the church-building programme it had in hand by appointing junior churchmen (probably specialists in this field) to supervise its various projects: Damasus I’s (366-84) drainage of the Vatican area was supervised by a deacon Mercurius, Innocent I’s (401-17) building of SS. Gervasio e Protasio, with money left for the purpose by Vestina, by the priests Ursicinus and Leopardus and the deacon Livianus, Leo I’s (440-61) repair of S. Paolo fuori-le-mura by the priests Felix and Adeodatus, and his building of S. Stefano in Via Latina, with money left by Demetria Anicia, by the priest Tigrinus.41 More disputable, but also more important, is the question of whether the conversion distracted secular patrons (rulers, courtiers, and local aristocrats) into the exclusive patronage of buildings that were good for their souls, and away from support of the traditional secular monuments. If this were the case, it would serve as an excellent explanation for the end of the classical pattern of patronage. However, in considering this question, it is essential to realize that by the time the conversion could be expected to have had a serious effect (by the mid fourth century), there was already very little traditional secular patronage to sup­ plant. This is particularly true of the local urban aristocracy, a group whose ecclesiastical patronage is extensively documented in the mosaic floors of many late antique churches and in the eighth-century Lucca charters. This aristocracy had been, as I showed in Chapter 1, the mainstay of classical secular building. But it would not be true to say that it switched in the fourth century from the old to the new patronage, for the very simple reason that by the early fourth century its traditional enthusiasm for secular building had already died.42 For this 41 Damasus: IL C V 1760. Innocent: Lib. P o n t i. 220-2. Leo, S. Paolo: Krautheimer, Corpus, v. 98-9. Leo, S. Stefano: IL C V 1765. 42 Seepp. 19-21.

Churches

67

aristocracy the building of churches was the revival of a wholly dead tradition of public building, not the elbowing out of a flourishing older style of patronage. The same is true of the high-ranking courtiers, whom we find active in church-building in capitals like Ravenna and Rome: in the field of traditional secular building and duties this class had mainly been distinguished for the complete success of its evasive tactics.43 By the mid fourth century, when church-building became common, only three categories of patron were still active in the field of secular building, and so in any position to be ‘dis­ tracted’ into ecclesiastical endeavour: the imperial governors of the provinces of Italy, the senatorial aristocracy based above all in Rome and Campania, and the imperial adminis­ tration itself. The first category, the governors, did undoubtedly stop building traditional secular monuments in the first decade of the fifth century.44 However, it is easier to attribute this break to the military and financial crisis sparked off by the Visigothic invasion than to religious change, since there is no evidence that governors after this date were spending public funds available to them on churches rather than secular buildings. In the case of the second category of patrons, the senatorial aristocracy, the conversion probably did have an effect, even if a limited and slow one. We find at least some members of this group patronizing church-building in Rome at about the time that senatorial patronage of secular buildings in Campania virtually ceases (in the early fifth century).45 The conversion was probably not the only cause for this change: it too may have been partly caused by the material and psychological trauma of the Visigothic invasions. However, in a letter of one aristocrat, Paulinus of Noia (353/4-431), is a clear statement that he at least did switch from the older style of building to the new. Writing about his construction of a church in Campania at Fondi, he explains his reasons for doing so: 43 Seep. 17. 44 Seep. 27. 45 See pp. 20-21 and Appendix 2.A.

68

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

The town is called Fondi, which was familiar to me while I still owned near by that estate which I often used to visit. I therefore decided to give Fondi a new church, both as a kind of token of affec­ tion for the town [ v e l a d p ig n u m q u a s i c iv ic a e c a r ita tis ] and as a mem­ orial to my old estate, since it needed a new church, having only a small and ruinous one .46

These reasons, the possession of a local estate and local civic pride, are precisely those that made earlier men, such as Pliny, erect public buildings in provincial towns like Tifernum Tiberinum and Co mum, near their estates; but in the case of Paulinus it is now a church, not a bath or library, that he builds.47 Paulinus was not only an aristocrat, but also a churchman himself, and so need not have been typical; unfortunately, we do not know how many laymen amongst the senatorial aristocracy also built churches in Campania in this period, though we do have record of men like Pammachius and Longinianus and women like Attica, Vestina, and Demetria Anicia building in Rome. Certainly the change would have affected zealous believers, like Paulinus, Pammachius, and Demetria Anicia, first, and perhaps only gradually and to a limited extent filtered into the ranks of the more worldly aristocracy. This is strongly suggested by the fact that in Rome we find aristocrats patronizing entertainment buildings and holding games (both activities anathema to the Church) right up to the catastrophe of the Gothic War (see Chapter 6 below). The problem of Christianity and its effect on imperial patronage is complicated. At first sight it would seem that the new religion merely replaced the patronage of temples with that of churches, leaving traditional imperial patronage of more neutral secular buildings unaffected. For instance, Constantine in and around Rome built not only the churches of St. Peter’s, S. Giovanni in Laterano, S. Agnese, S. Lorenzo, and SS. Marcellino e Pietro, but also a great new bath-building and a triumphal arch, and completed the huge secular basilica on the Forum begun by Maxentius. Two centuries later we find Theodoric, another great builder, constructing not only 46 Paulinus, Ep. xxxii. 17.

47 For Pliny see p. 4 nn. 3 and 4 above.

Churches

69

churches in Ravenna (and probably elsewhere), but also patronizing baths, aqueducts, and entertainment buildings.48 It seems that very little had changed between c.300 arid c.500 as a result of the conversion, and that the great change came only with the Lombard invasion and the advent of kings little interested in traditional displays of munificence. Initial appearances may, however, be deceptive and be the result of exceptional circumstances in Ostrogothic times. Theodoric and his successors were Arian heretics trying to rule Italy in a Roman mould. In the documents written at the Ostrogothic court for their orthodox Roman subjects to read, it was therefore necessary to ignore royal religious building, whereas it was thoroughly desirable to stress their patronage of the traditional secular monuments. However, the surviving splendour of Theodoric’s S. Apollinare Nuovo, which is not mentioned in any contemporary source, shows that the picture these documents give is by no means com­ plete as a representation of Ostrogothic patronage. For all we know, the Ostrogoths in fact spent far more on Arian churches than they ever did on baths or amphitheatres. Even if the Ostrogoths really did concentrate on secular building (because it was neutral in religion and Roman in spirit), I think it can be shown that in doing so they would have been exceptional and old-fashioned by sixth-century standards. Procopius, in his Buildings, gives an account of a roughly contemporary ruler-patron, Justinian: he does also list a large number of secular works erected by the Emperor (including baths, entertainment buildings, and porticoes, as well as palaces and city walls), but accords these a very inferior second place, and much less space, after the churches. It is quite clear that by the sixth century in the East most imperial money and attention had shifted towards the building of churches, like S. Sophia, and away from the monuments of secular enjoyment, though these latter were not-totally ignored. This change of emphasis had probably already occurred in Italy in the fifth century. With the important exceptions of palaces and fortifications, there is very little evidence of 48 Constantine: see Appendix 2 A and Chapter 3 above. Theodoric: see Appendix 2.B and Chapter 3 above.

70

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

imperial patronage of secular buildings, but there is con­ siderable evidence of church-building (see Appendix 2.A and B). Furthermore, of those secular buildings erected, several now had a church as their focus. In 379/83 Gratian, Valentinian, and Theodosius erected in Rome a new portico ending in a triumphal arch, but this was built not in the old monumental heart of the city but on the approach to the Pons Aelius leading to St. Peter’s. Similarly, in 405, after the victory of Pollentia, Arcadius, Honorius, and Theodosius built their main victory-monument at one end of the Pons Neronianus (the other bridge linking the city to the Vatican area), whereas in the Forum they erected only statues to celebrate this victory and that over Gildo in 398.49 Only in Ostrogothic times was this clear shift of emphasis towards ecclesiastical building, at least in appearance, reversed, and then only for very particular religious and political reasons. Consequently, I think it can be said that in the important field of direct imperial and royal patronage the effect of Christianity was marked. The new religion did gradually take to its own buildings a larger share of the money available, leaving the traditional monuments with less. This was, how­ ever, a slow process, possibly reversed in Ostrogothic times, and by no means complete by the mid sixth century, when it was overtaken by much more rapid change of a different kind: the result of the arrival in most of the peninsula of new barbarian rulers less interested in a polished veneer of tradi­ tional Roman government and munificence, and of the rapid descent of Byzantine Italy to the status of a beleaguered province. As we have seen, the evidence that Christianity elbowed out traditional secular patronage is limited, and it is clear that for most of the propertied classes the construction of churches was a wholly new venture into public building, or a venture into it after several decades of inactivity. This does not mean 49 379/83: Platner-Ashby, 40; CIL vi. 1184 = IL S 781. 405: Plainer-Ashby, 33-4; CIL vi. 1196 = ILS 798. Statues in Forum: CIL vi. 1187 = 31256; PlatnerAshby, 145 (quadriga to the emperors after 398); CIL vi. 1730, 1731, and 31987 ; Nash, ii. 401 (statues to Stilicho after Pollentia). I have treated all these works as ‘imperial’, despite the fact that only the arch of 379/83 was specifically stated to have been erected pecunia propria ; the other monuments were ostensibly erected by the Senatus Populusque Romanus (as was customary for such monuments).

Churches

71

that there was no connection between the old and the new. On the contrary, it is clear that one of the reasons that church-building was popular was that it satisfied many of the secular needs once met by old-style building, as well as many new religious needs. Religious motivation of one kind or another was undoubt­ edly the main force. In particular, church-building was a pious act that benefited the soul, something that no classical secular building, nor indeed any pagan temple had been able to do. It could help the salvation of a whole family: when Warnefred, gastald of Siena, built and endowed the monastery of S. Eugenio in 730, this was done ‘for the redemption of the souls of my father and mother, and the benefit of our own souls and of our relations, both those dead and those to come’.50 Such benefit was particularly strong if the building was coupled to the foundation of a religious community which in prayer would intercede for its benefactors. In 685 it was carefully stipulated that the monks of Faulo’s restored monastery of S. Frediano at Lucca could enjoy the property he had given them, but on their part ‘you must pray for the soul and the family of Faulo, both you monks of the present time and those who succeed you’.51 Another religious function that church-building could serve was to help affairs on earth (as indeed temples had done), by buying the goodwill of the Almighty or his saints, or by thanking them for past benefits. Serena, wife of Stilicho, paved the floor of S. Nazaro in Milan in order to obtain the safe return of her husband, ‘that she might joy­ fully see the return of Stilicho.’52 In Ravenna, slightly later, Galla Placidia built the church of S. Giovanni Evangelista in gratitude for surviving a shipwreck: ‘she fulfilled her vow in return for being saved from the dangers of the sea’. Other churches were built in return for unspecified beneficia, such as Julianus and Bacauda’s S. Michele in Africisco in sixthcentury Ravenna.53 Though it is hard to document, it is probable that another 50 Schiaparelli, CDL, no. 50. 51 Ibid., no. 7. S2C IL v. 6250. 53 See Appendix 2.B and Deichmann, Kommentar, ii. 15-16 for other examples.

72

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

powerful motivation behind church-building (in this case on the borderline between the religious and the worldly) was rivalry between different church communities. It is, I believe, as much a sign of such rivalry as a reflection of the peace and prosperity of Ostrogothic times, that the early sixth century in Ravenna was a period of very active Arian and Orthodox building (despite the loss of much court patronage by the latter sect). The Arians in this period certainly built S. Apol­ linare Nuovo, S. Eusebio (which had an episcopium attached), and S. Andrea dei Goti, possibly also the Arian cathedral and baptistery, and probably at least some of the other churches and episcopal dwellings they are recorded to have held: the extramural S. Giorgio (also with an episcopium), S. Sergio in Classe, S. Zeno in Cesarea, and the episcopium, palace-chapel, and baths by the Arian cathedral.54 The Orthodox began and completed a major new addition to their episcopal palace and a new palace-chapel, the church of S. Maria Maggiore, and a new baptistery at Classe; they also began Julianus’ three great churches of S. Michele in Africisco, S. Apollinare in Classe, and S. Vitale.55 I think one can hardly avoid the con­ clusion that one motive behind all this activity was rivalry: the Orthodox added to and embellished their episcopium at the very time that rival episcopal palaces existed within and without the walls of Ravenna, and they began, with S. Vitale, to erect a church which, when completed, was the finest of all Ravenna and put even the great Arian church of S. Apol­ linare Nuovo in the shade. Such rivalry probably also existed between religious com­ munities of the same sect but of different towns. In the late eighth and ninth centuries a new fashion for building crypts in churches swept through Italy and northern Europe.56 This was the architectural manifestation of a passion for relic­ hunting, and a desire to display these relics in a fit manner. In all this there was undoubtedly on occasion an element of keeping up with (or if possible outdoing) rival communities. 54 See Appendix 2.B; also Agnellus, RR.II.SS. 216-19, and Deichmann, Kommentar, i. 243-5. 55 See Appendix 2.B for the churches and Chapter 8, section III for the palace. 56 See, for instance, R. Krautheimer, ‘The Carolingian Revival of Early Christian Architecture’, A rt Bulletin, 24 (1942), 1-38.

Churches

73

Bishop John of Lucca in 780 translated the relics of S. Regolo to his cathedral and built a crypt to house them, which is described as being modelled on the confessio of St. Peter’s in Rome.57 At some date, almost certainly rather later, the cathedral of nearby and rival Luna was provided with an identical crypt.58 It can not be proved that the bishop of Luna was responding to developments in Lucca, but it is very likely. Alongside various forms of religious motivation there could exist more worldly reasons for ecclesiastical building and endowment. Some of these reasons are not particularly relevant to my thesis, such as the foundation and use of small monastic Eigenkirche as a means to secure family landholding in the early Middle Ages. However, I wish to explore one particular motive in detail, the desire for secular prestige, since this provides an obvious link and continuity between older classical patronage (which was above all intended to buy worldly esteem) and the new Christian munificence. Though the type of building patronized might change radically between classical and early medieval times, some of the moti­ vation behind patronage could remain unaltered. The best evidence of the role of church-building in bolster­ ing prestige on earth comes from the vast number of inscrip­ tions placed prominently in the churches of Italy to record the construction and decoration paid for by various donors. In most cases the original inscriptions have long since dis­ appeared, since in the late antique and early medieval periods these were generally in mosaic or fresco, and have proved far less durable than the building-inscriptions of classical antiquity, carved on unmovable marble elements of the buildings they commemorate. None the less we are fortunate in having from Rome an exceptional group of early medieval and later sylloges of inscriptions, transcribed before many of these disappeared, and from Ravenna the evidence of an assiduous ninth-century transcriber, Agnellus, who referred to or even gave in full a large number of the building-inscriptions 57 Bert. i. 390. To the best of my knowledge, this very early example is not mentioned in the literature of annular crypts. 58 I. Belli Barsali, ‘Fasi di lavoro medievali alla basilica cristiana di Luni’, Palladio, 14 (1964), 157-64.

74

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

of the town (very few of which now survive).59 The rare remaining examples and the record of the placing of many others prove that these inscriptions were invariably promin­ ently placed, generally either above the main door (as the surviving inscription in S. Sabina), or over the triumphal arch (as at S. Maria Maggiore), òr in the apse (as in many papal Roman churches, like SS. Cosma e Damiano or S. Prassede). In some cases the donor was commemorated in a number of different places. In S. Vitale at Ravenna the patron, Julianus, was not only recorded in two inscriptions in the atrium, one of which proudly described him as the man who ‘built, decorated, and dedicated’ the church, but also in monograms on various column-capitals, and in an inscription which recorded the precise sum, 36,000 solidi, which he had spent on the building.60 The record in the case of Julianus of the exact sum of money spent on a church is unique in Italy (though it can be parallelled in near-contemporary Gaul and in earlier secular monuments all over the Roman world); however, it was normal everywhere, including Italy, to specify very precisely exactly how much of a building was due to whom.61 This is particularly clear in the large number of late antique floormosaics, spelling out precisely the number of feet given by different donors.62 This was perhaps also the case with decor­ ation above ground, though no examples now survive. How­ ever, in the ninth century Agnellus was able to describe (certainly basing his information on inscriptions) precisely who had provided how much of the decoration of Ravenna’s cathedral.63 When a building was begun by one builder and completed by another, the inscription was always careful to specify this point. In the sixth-century church of SS. Apostoli in Rome, begun by Pope Pelagius I (556-61) and completed by John III (561-74), an inscription over the door read: ‘Pelagius began it and Pope John completed it: it was the work of both, and 59 The Roman sylloges are collected in De Rossi, Inscr, Christ., voi. ii. 60 See Appendix 2.B. 61 Gaul (Narbonne): CIL xii. 5336 = IL C V 1806; H. I. Marrou, ‘Le Dossier épigraphique de l’évêque Rusticus de Narbonne’, Rivista di Archeologia Cristiana, 46 (1970), 331-49. 62 See p. 53 n. 5 above. 63 Agnellus, RR.ILSS. 66-7.

Churches

75

the credit for it shines equally [par micat et meritum] '; in a second inscription in the apse John also acknowledged his predecessor, though here not by name and claiming rather more of the credit: ‘An earlier pope left here small beginnings [parva vestigia] ; Pope John completed the work that had been started.’64 In part these inscriptions may have been intended to attract the intercession of the faithful. Leo IV (847-55) put new silver panels on the doors of St. Peter’s ‘so that all those who entered the basilica should render praise to God the omnipotent and to his holy bishop, and should ask that many years be added to the life of that Pope, who had decorated the church with such splendour and beauty with seventy pounds of silver.’65 But it is quite clear from their wording that the inscriptions were also intended to excite worldly admiration and esteem: they very rarely appeal for the reader’s prayers, but describe or state proudly the patron’s achievement. Occasionally they are explicit in their desire for fame. In Ravenna an inscription commemorating the building of the archiépiscopal chapel by Bishop Peter II (494-519) stated: ‘to him the honour and to him the credit’, and in Rome an inscription in Pope Damasus’ (366-84) church of S. Lorenzo, apparently commemorating the building of an archive, spoke of ‘columns to bear the name of Damasus through the centuries’ (which indeed the church of S. Lorenzo in Damaso has very effectively done).66 Prestige as at least a partial motivation for building is also very clear in the inscriptions set up in late antiquity by secular patrons, which describe not only the extent of their munifi­ cence, but also their own precise titles and honours. Flavius Constantius Felix, who provided the apse-mosaic of S. Giovanni in Laterano in 428/30, was careful to describe him­ self there as *v(ir) c(larissimus), magister utriusque militiae, patricius et cons(ul) ord(inarius)’, and Marinianus, who provided the mosaics on the façade of St. Peter’s in 440-61, similarly recorded his work with his titles of ‘vir inl(ustris) ex 64 De Rossi, Inscr. Christ. ii. 139 no 27 = IL C V 1766A; De Rossi, Inscr. Christ. ii. 65 no. 18 and 248 no. 14 = IL C V 1766B. 65 Lib. Pont. ii. 127. 66 Ravenna: Agnellus, RR.ILSS. 149-50. Rome: De Rossi, Inscr. Christ. ii. 151 no. 23 = Epigr. Dam. 210-12.

76

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

p(rae)f(ectus) [praetorio] etcons(ul) ord(inarius)’.67 Nothing, besides the additional benefit of a reputation for piety, separates these inscriptions from the proud assertions to present and future generations placed on the secular monu­ ments of classical times. In this context it is worth- citing a piece of evidence from the eastern half of the Empire. In Justinian’s Novel 67 the Emperor ordered the man who ‘perhaps wished to be known as the builder of a church’, not to build yet another badly endowed church ‘nominis causa’, but to spend his money on the repair of the decayed churches of Constantinople and the provinces. This law, though dealing with churches, has exactly the same background, of an exaggerated search for prestige through building, as the fourth-century laws ordering governors of Rome and the provinces to restore ruinous secular buildings, rather than indulge in useless but more prestigious new foundation.68 From the early Middle Ages (i.e. after c.550) only a few building-inscriptions survive or cire recorded outside Rome and Ravenna; but enough evidence exists to show that new or re­ stored buildings were continuously commemorated in this same way. At Pavia a small group of such inscriptions have survived or been recorded (see Appendix 2.C, those foundations with ‘Panazza’ as a source). At Lucca, although no inscriptions now exist from all the many foundations mentioned in the charters, we have a transcription of the epitaph of Bishop James {ob. 818), which carefully set out his building achieve­ ment, and the explicit statement that Bishop John, who built the crypt of the cathedral, ‘made the beautiful rails [cancellos] around the Holy of Holies, on which he had inscribed the fact that he had done those things which we have described’.69 It would in fact be surprising if there were no element of competition for prestige and desire for fame after death 67 Felix: De Rossi, Inscr. Christ. ii. 149 no. 17 = ILS 1293 = IL C V 68. Marinianus: De Rossi, Inscr. Christ. ii. 55 = Silvagni,Inscr. Christ, n.s. 4102 = IL C V 1758. 68 See pp. 32 and 40. 69 Bishop James: given in full in Appendix 2.D. Bishop John: Bert. i. 390. We also have one surviving early ninth-century building-inscription from a church in the countryside near Lucca: A. Silvagni,Monumenta Epigrafica Christiana (Vatican City, 1943), voi. iii.l, tab. vi.2.

Churches

77

behind the building of so many churches and monasteries in eighth- and early ninth-century Lucca. This competition may possibly be reflected in the way that several of these founda­ tions acquired the names of their Lombard founders, though we do not know for certain whether this was intended by their patrons: at Lucca, S. Maria ‘Ursimanni’, S. Pietro ‘Somaldi’, and S. Pietro ‘Bellerifonsi’. This is a phenomenon that can be paralleled in other Lombard towns (as with Pavia’s Monastero ‘del Senatore’ and S. Maria ‘Teodote’, or Milan’s S. Maria ‘di Aurona’ and S. Salvatore ‘Dateo’), as well as in late antique Rome (as with SS. Giovanni e Paolo, known as the titulus Pammachi, and S. Lorenzo in Damaso, where the name does seem to have been intended). The importance of church-building in establishing a secular or ecclesiastical ruler’s reputation is also clear in the written sources of the period, which, when listing achievement, con­ tinue to lay stress on all forms of building activity (by this date above all involving churches). The Liber Pontificalis lists in loving detail the building and embellishment (above all of churches, but also of palaces, walls, and aqueducts) by the popes of Rome. It is quite clear that fine building was expected of the popes as an external display of both their piety and their splendour, just as much as building had once been ex­ pected of emperors. In one of the few hostile accounts we have from this period we see another side to this same coin, and learn that the wish to excel in building could lead to harsh exactions and bitterness for a ruler’s subjects: the attack on Pope Sergius II (844-7) and his brother Benedict included in the Liber Pontificalis lists amongst its complaints that ‘Since he was foolish and devoted to rustic activities [operibus rusticis deditus', somewhat obscure!], he spent all those funds intended for the church and for the public need on walls and on various buildings. So much so, that he did not cease from working and from troubling us day and night’, and, more specifically, that Sergius’ greatest project, the demolition and rebuilding of S. Martino ai Monti, was done only ‘so that, with the pretext of this demolition and reconstruction, he might more freely plunder the churches and the people’.70 70 Lib. Pont. ii. 97-8. For general praise of builder-popes: Lib. Pont. i. 499 (Hadrian I: . amator ecclesiarum Dei, magnam . . . gerens curam pro ornatu et

78

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

In the ninth century two works, the Gesta Episcoporum Neapolitanorum and the Liber Pontificalis Ecclesiae Raven­ natis (of Agnellus), were produced in emulation and rivalry of Rome’s Liber Pontificalis, and they too lay a heavy stress on the building activities of the bishops (though admittedly mainly for the early period, for which other information was scanty). For secular builders, Paul the Deacon in his Historia Langobardorum gave a place (though a relatively minor one) to the churches constructed by the various Lombard kings; and in his epitaph of Duke Arechis II of Benevento (758-87), a great builder of palaces, churches, and fortifications, he spoke both of this achievement and of the fame it would ensure: ‘You have adorned your country with learning, buildings, and palaces [doctrinis, moenibus, aulis] ; you will be praised for this into eternity.’71 Ecclesiastical building not only took over from secular building the general function of providing an outlet for con­ spicuous expenditure and satisfaction for the desire to buy worldly fame and lasting reputation; in some cases it also took over the precise functions once served by secular build­ ings. I shall explore one of these cases, the baths, in a future chapter. Here I should like briefly to refer to three more functions, the building of churches and chapels to serve as mausolea, the embellishment and building of churches to serve as victory monuments, and the use of churches as a venue for honorific portraiture. The desire for a fitting burial place was certainly often a powerful incentive to build a church, or more often a chapel. A late antique inscription from a church in Pozzuoli (Puteoli) is unusually explicit in this respect: it states that the building had been acquired and restored specifically to serve for the burial place and commemoration of an infant child, ‘in whose honour this church was bought and repaired by his parents’.72 Even when it is not explicitly stated, a similar motive is often clear. Pope Damasus I (366-84) built a basilica outside Rome on the Via Ardeatina and was buried there with his mother restauratione . . . earundem’), and ii. 52 (Paschal I: ‘restaurator atque in omnibus devotissimus exornator’). 71 Paulus Diaconus, Gedichte, 147. The ‘moenibus’ may be city walls: see p. 197 n. 63 below. 72 CIL x. 3310/11 = IL C V 1789.

Churches

79

and sister; it seems reasonable to conclude that at least one motive behind the foundation was the wish for a worthy family burial place.73 In Ravenna the founder and another major embellisher óf the church of S. Lorenzo in Cesarea were prominently buried within the church (where Agnellus saw their tombs), and a number of bishops and archbishops throughout our period are recorded to have built and decor­ ated small chapels in which they were subsequently buried.74 In Pavia in 714 a rich noble, Senator, founded the ‘Monastero del Senatore’, in which he was later buried under a magnificent carved marble slab which still survives.75 The splendour of this latter strongly suggests that Senator had his own burial at least partly in mind when he endowed his foundation. In Rome, in the early ninth century, Pope Paschal I attached the tiny but highly ornate chapel of S. Zeno to his foundation of S. Prassede. This chapel contained not only relics and mosaics of martyrs, but also the body of the Pope’s mother and a representation of her head amongst the mosaics.76 The chapel must have been intended at least in part to give her both a holy and an impressive burial. From Lucca there is record of a particularly good example of a burial church. The epitaph of Bishop James {ob. 818), which recorded all his ecclesiastical building work, began: Tn this church rests Bishop James, who was the founder of this same church of the Resurrection and of the Holy Cross of the Mount of Olives, from which our Lord ascended into heaven . . .’ This church {ecclesia) was probably a small chapel by S. Frediano, and its dedication proves beyond doubt that it was built specifically as James’s burial place.77 Such use of churches as personal or dynastic burial places is very well illustrated by the information that Paul the Deacon supplies about the burial places of the Lombard kings in Pavia. Queen Gundiperga, wife of Arioald and Rothari, was buried in her foundation of S. Giovanni Domnarum: ‘. . . she built inside the city of Pavia a church in honour of 73 Lib. Pont. i. 212-13. . 74 S. Lorenzo: Agnellus, RR.ILSS. 96-8; Deichmann, Kommentar, ii. 336-40. 75 Panazza, no. 64. 76 Lib. Pont. ii. 64 n. 10, lines 3 8 -4 0 and n. 14. 77 Bars. no. 1759; Belli Barsali, 538 no. 54, The whole inscription is given in Appendix 2.D.

80

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

John the Baptist, which she decorated splendidly with gold, silver, and precious cloth, and which she richly endowed with individual gifts [rebusque singulis] ;her body lies buried in this church’.78 Aripert I (653-61) founded the church of S. Salvatore, and near it were buried his son Perctarit (672-88), his grandson Cunicpert (680-700), and his greatgrandson Aripert II (701-12).79 The usurper Grimoald (662-71), however, was buried in his own foundation of S. Ambrogio.80 Ansprand (712) and his son Liutprand (712-44), who belonged to a new dynasty, were buried in the church of S. Adriano beside S. Maria in Pertica.81 It seems that the dynasty of Aripert I, buried ‘iuxta’ (near) the church of S. Salvatore, and that of Ansprand, buried in the church of S. Adriano annexed to the major church of S. Maria in Pertica, were buried (like Bishop James of Lucca) in small mausolea-chapels attached to major shrines. This may have been normal early medieval practice, but it may also have been in imitation of late antique imperial burials (such as that of the Honorian dynasty in a mausoleum by St. Peter’s).82 The evidence for churches coming to take on the function of victory-monuments is scanty but suggestive. Secular triumphal arches were erected in Rome by Constantine after 314 (an arch which still survives), by Gratian, Valentinian, and Theodosius in 379/83, and by Arcadius, Honorius, and Theodosius in 405, although the latter two, as we have seen above, had abandoned the traditional but pagan Via Sacra for the approaches to St. Peter’s. But after these no more such arches are known; yet this does not mean that victories ceased to be commemorated in buildings and embellishments. On the contrary, Belisarius is known to have given a bejewelled gold cross to St. Peter’s, on which he recorded his victories over the Vandals: ‘he gave to the blessed Apostle Peter . . . a jewelled gold cross, weighing 100 pounds, on which he re­ corded his victories . . .’, and the Lombard king Cunicpert 78 Hist. Lang. iv. 47. 79 Aripert I: Hist. Lang. iv. 48. Perctarit: Hist. Lang. v. 37. Cunicpert: Hist. Lang. vi. i 7. Aripert II: Hist. Lang. vi. 35. 80 Hist. Lang. v. 33. 81 Hist. Lang. vi. 58. Lombard royal burials are briefly discussed in K. H. Krüger, Königsgrabkirchen des Franken, Angelsachsen und Langobarden bis zur M itte des 8. Jahrhunderts: ein historischer Katalog (Munich, 1971). 87 Honorian Mausoleum: Krautheimer, Corpus, v. 173.

Churches

81

erected a monastery on the battlefield of Coronate, where in 688 he defeated his rival Alachis.83 Belisarius’ cross and Cunicpert’s monastery could serve both as thank-offerings to the Almighty and as commemorations of victory. Indeed, already in Constantine’s time there are signs of a shift towards church-building as a means to record victory, for precisely the reason that this could combine celebration with pious thanks. Although Constantine built by the Colosseum a tradi­ tional triumphal arch (perhaps to please the pagan Roman aristocracy), in St. Peter’s he also celebrated and gave thanks for his victory in a mosaic inscription placed prominently over the ‘triumphal arch’ of the church: ‘Because through your leadership the world has risen triumphant to the stars, Constantine the victorious built for you this church.’84 The problem of understanding the extent to which por­ traiture in churches took on the role of classical honorific statuary is complicated by the destruction of much evidence. However, a few things are clear. First, it is certain that in the first centuries of church­ building the secular aristocracy and lesser churchmen were in Italy not normally allowed to be represented in the churches: this was a privilege restricted to rulers of Church and State. For instance, in Julianus’ foundation of S. Vitale the patron himself was not represented in mosaic, though the bishop who agreed the foundation, the bishop who con­ secrated it, and the emperor and empress who ruled at the time of dedication all were (the only lesser figures shown are unnamed courtiers in the train of Justinian and Theo­ dora). The only exceptions I know to this restriction are the figures of the archdeacon Claudius and his son Eufrasius, who appear with Bishop Eufrasius in the apse of the sixthcentury church at Pore£ (Parenzo).85 Only in the late eighth century do we find evidence of laymen and lesser churchmen appearing as a matter of course in the frescos and mosaics of churches: in Rome, Theodotus, who embellished a chapel by S. Maria Antiqua, and Gaiferius, who similarly decorated S. Adriano in Foro, both appear as donors in the 83 Belisarius: Lib. Pont. i. 296. Cunicpert: Hist. Lang. vi. 17. 84 De Rossi, Inscr. Christ, ii. 20 no. 6 and 345 no. 1 = IL C V 1752. 85 This is conveniently illustrated in Brown, fig. 90.

82

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

frescos.86 Because such portraiture appears so late, we must conclude that if it did fill a need once supplied by classiceli statuary, for most classes of society it was only after a gap of several centuries. Secondly, a careful distinction must be made between episcopal and aristocratic church portraiture (when the latter finally appears) and the honorific statuary of antiquity. This latter was generally set up by a town, or a group within a town, in gratitude for a man’s help in any number of ways (see Appendix 1 ). Church portraiture of bishops and aristocrats was rather different, in that it was set up almost invariably to mark a particular form of benefit (the building or decoration of a church), and was generally ordered by the benefactors themselves. However, despite its more limited application, it may well have been a popular form of commemoration, much as in antiquity. Paulinus of Noia in 403/4 wrote to his friend Sulpicius Severus, who intended to include Paulinus’ portrait in his new church at Primuliacum in Gaul (in this case apparently for purely honorific reasons); Paulinus affected considerable modesty over this matter, but was clearly very pleased indeed.87 The assiduousness with which popes included their own dònor-figures in the apses of their buildings also suggests that they too derived satisfaction in this form of commemoration, and indeed this is almost stated in the Liber Pontificalis’s description of John VII’s (705-7) embellishment of various churches: ‘He made images in several churches, in which whoever is curious can find his face depicted.’88 In the case of imperial and royal portraiture the position is more complicated, and in this case it is at least arguable that portraits in churches did in a direct manner take over some of the function of old-style statuary. In a few cases rulers appear in the churches, like the bishops and the aristocracy, only in their specialized new capacity as church-donors, as perhaps Theodoric did in S. Apollinare Nuovo.89 However, we also 86 See Appendix 2.A, Aristocratic Patronage, ‘Theodotus’ and ‘Gaiferius’. 87 Paulinus, Ep. xxx.2 and xxxii. 2 -4 . 88 Lib. Pont. i. 385. 89 Deichmann, Kom m entar, i. 143-4. This may have been a sixth-century innovation: it is disputed whether the donor-figure of Constantine in St. Peter’s was original or not.

Churches

83

find representations of rulers placed in churches for less specific reasons. Julianus’ S. Vitale, which received no imper­ ial money at all (otherwise this would certainly have been stated in the recorded inscriptions), none the less still contains mosaics of Justinian, Theodora and their entourage. The Emperor also appeared in the mosaics added to S. Apollinare Nuovo by Bishop Agnellus when he rededicated it to the orthodox faith, although again there is no evidence of Jus­ tinian being a donor to the church.90 It seems likely that both these portraits were much like the statues of emperors formerly set up in the fora and other places by individuals or communities, as a sign of respect and as a means of gaining favour. In Ostrogothic times the older secular forms of com­ memoration of rulers were still very much alive, since a huge bronze equestrian statue of Theodoric was set up in Ravenna.91 But again it is possible that the Ostrogoths were, in such secular display of kingship, already slightly old-fashioned. Justinian their conqueror, though perhaps setting up a similar secular bronze statue to himself in Constantinople, in Ravenna seems to have preferred a more Christian setting and style of depiction, as in the S. Vitale and S. Apollinare mosaics.92 The only Byzantine emperor and ruler of Italy who is known to have been commemorated there by a traditional secular statue was Phocas, who had a statue erected to him in the Roman Forum, the bastion of tradition, in 608.93 After Justinian the evidence is very scanty and not enough to suggest a general practice. We know that the painted imperial icons of the rulers of Constantinople regularly sent to Rome were displayed in a religious setting in the chapel of the Palatine palace.94 We also know that Leo III set up por­ traits of Charlemagne alongside his own, in the mosaics he commissioned in S. Susanna and in his triclinium in the 90 Agnellus, R R JI.SS. 218-19. 91 See p. 164 n. 24 below. 92 For the Constantinople statue: P. Williams Lehman, ‘Theodosius or Justinian? A Renaissance Drawing of a Byzantine Rider’, The A rt Bulletin (March 1959), 39-57. The decline of eastern public statuary is attributed by Mango to the decline of sculpture in the round; I wonder whether this is not in fact confusing cause and effect: C. Mango, ‘Antique Statuary and the Byzantine Beholder*, Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 17 (1963), 55-75. 93 See p. 48 n. 45 above. 94 See p. 167 n. 39 below.

84

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

Lateran palace (a religious building as far as its decoration was concerned). Here again there is no evidence to link Charlemagne with the particular buildings where he appeared, and it is clear that Leo included his portrait as a general mark of respect.95 Probably this was by this date a very exceptional gesture, and I have found no good evidence of anything similar elsewhere in Italy. In Lombard Italy (where admit­ tedly the evidence is very poor) the only ruler-portrait recorded is one of Arechis II (758-87), duke of Benevento, mentioned in a church in Capua by a tenth-century source; but here it is not clear whether Arechis appeared as a donor or in an honorific role.95 Although I have in the second half of this chapter separated out motivation for church-building into two broad strands of ‘religious’ and ‘secular’ (mainly in order to examine the latter in relation to classical patronage), I must finally stress that the distinction is largely artificial. The very appeal of church­ building lay in the way it united secular and religious activity. Popes, archbishops, rulers, and aristocrats who erected churches and placed their figure in the apse and their name in the inscription were, by so doing, not just proclaiming themselves great, rich, and powerful men, but also proclaim­ ing themselves, to both the Almighty and the world, great churchmen. 95 J. Deer, ‘Die Vorrechte des Kaisers in Rom (772-800)’, Schweizer Beiträge zu r allgemeinen Geschichte, 15 (1957), 23-42. 96 Chron. S a i, 1 7, c. 11.

5

The End of the Temples In the field of public building the most obvious destructive result of the conversion to Christianity was the abandonment and decay of the pagan temples. This could occur in two very different ways: either through violent desecration and demoli­ tion by Christian fanatics, or by a slower, but no less effec­ tive, removal of the funds needed for maintenance. From Italy there is in fact very little evidence of violent destruction of pagan shrines. In Rome itself the only reliable record is in a letter of Jerome telling of the destruction of a Mithraeum and the breaking up of its statues by a newly converted praefectus urbi, Gracchus, in 376/7.1 In nearby Ostia there is possible archaeological evidence of similar destruction of two of the town’s Mithraea and of the deliber­ ate building over one of them of a Christian church.2 However, we have evidence from Rome of the survival of other cult buildings and their fittings right up to Ostrogothic times (see below), and it is possible that, in this conservative city, vio­ lence was restricted to the buildings of the private oriental initiation-cults, such as that of Mithras. Outside Rome, to the best of my knowledge, good evidence of Christian destruction is entirely lacking. However, it may be that this is only because we do not have from Italy a set of early lives of the saints in which we could expect to find evidence of such holy demolition work.3 Maximus of Turin in the early fifth century railed against idolatry and idols in his sermons; if we had a life of him we might well find that he also went round smashing pagan statues and temples.4 1 Jerome,.#/?, cvii. 2. 2 Meiggs, 401. 3 This lack of lives of the saints was what Gregory the Great later sought to fill in the Dialogues. 4 Maximus of Turin, Sermo xlii. 1, xlviii. 4, evi. 2, cvii, cviii. For the violent destruction of a church near Trento in 397, perhaps suggestive of violence by both sides of the religious dispute: Enciclopedia Catholica, ‘Alessandro, Martino e

86

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

Those temples spared a violent end gradually closed and fell into decay through slow starvation of the funds needed to maintain them. These were eventually wholly cut off in 382, when Gratian decreed the confiscation of all property destined for the maintenance of the pagan cults. In 391 Theodosius followed this up with a famous law, issued at Milan and surviving in the copy sent to the praefectus urbi of Rome, completely banning the cults themselves.6 But even before this legislative end to the financing of the cults and their shrines, many of the temples must have been in serious decay. Partly this was because of the general decline of tradi­ tional patronage, which I have explored in Chapters 2 and 3. However, this seems to have affected the temples worse than any other category of building. It is a remarkable fact that, despite the survival in Italy of a rich and largely pagan aristoc­ racy until the early fifth century, there is very little epigraphic or literary evidence of these pagans putting their own private funds into temple buildings. The only certain evidence of this aristocracy erecting pagan buildings in the fourth century concerns the private mystery-cult of Mithras. In Rome, Tanjesius Olympius Augentius set up an inscription recording not only his own building of a Mithraic cave, but also his grandfather’s building of a temple of Mithras: ‘His grandfather Victor, a devotee of heaven and the stars, once built at regal expense a temple of Mithras [Phoebeia temple] . . . [Augentius] builds a cave, and does not require funds of yours, City of Rome [sumptusque tuos nec, Roma, requirit).'1 The reference to not needing public funds for this second work suggests a date at the period of the debate about the use of public funds for pagan cults, after Gatian’s decree of 382. Indeed this dating would fit a possible identification of Augentius as the son and grandson of two earlier fourth-century aristocrats, both known to have Sissinio’. For destruction of temples in the East, and in Gaul (by Martin of Tours): G. Fowden, ‘Bishops and Temples in the Eastern Roman Empire, A.D. 320-435’, Journal o f Theological Studies, NS 29 (1978), 53-78 (the Italian evidence is, how­ ever, exaggerated by the drawing of direct parallels between Maximus of Turin and Martin of Tours). 5 Matthews, 204; Bloch, ‘New Document’, 213-15; Symmachus, Rei. 3; Ambrose, Ep. 17 and 18. The decree itself does not survive. 6 C. Th. xvi. 10. 10. 7 CIL vi. 754 = ILS 4296.

The End o f the Temples

87

been devoted to the Mithraic cult: his grandfather Victor may well have been Nonius Victor Olympius, who set up a series of Mithraic inscriptions between 357 and 362.8 For the private patronage of the traditional public cults there is no good evidence. The construction of a temple of Venus by a certain ‘Symmachus heres’, mentioned in the anonymous Carmen contra paganos of the years around 400, may possibly refer to private building by a member of this great pagan family, but it could equally well refer to works carried out with public funds while the man concerned held some such office as the prefecture of the city.9 This apparent lack of private patronage of the public cults is at first sight startling and puzzling. However, I think Matthews has recently produced the correct explanation: the traditional public cults had to be maintained from public funds, since this was an integral part of the bargain of the Pax Deorum between the gods and the State. Therefore, only the private mystery-cults were privately financed.10 As we have seen in Chapters 2 and 3, public funds were never sufficient in the fourth century to take on the whole burden of maintenance and repair of public buildings. In the case of the temples the situation was exacerbated by the fact that only pagan officials would ever spend public money on temple buildings, and even these men perhaps rarely felt strongly enough to risk the unpopularity of a large section of the population. There is only one major new pagan building project recorded in the fourth century, and this dates from the very early years after the conversion, when even the religion of the emperor was a little unclear: in 333/7 a temple to the family of Constantine, the gens Flavia, was built at Hispellum (Spello) in Umbria, probably from local public funds (though this is not specifically stated).11 It is very striking that * For these men: PLRE I, Augentius 1, Augentius 2, and Olympius 18. 9 ThusJ. F. Matthews, ‘The Historical Setting of the “Carmen contra paganos” Historia, 19 (1970), 477, attributing the reference to Nicomachus Flavianus (sonin-law of Q. Aurelius Symmachus), praefectus urbi in 393. Otherwise the reference is to Symmachus himself {praefectus urbi in 384) or to his son: Bloch, ‘New Document’, 233 n. 78. 10 J . F. Matthews, ‘Symmachus and the Oriental Cults’, Journal o f Roman Studies, 6 3 (1 9 7 3 ), 176-8. 11 CIL xi. 5265 = IL S 705; Jones, L R E , 93.

88

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

out of all the inscriptions recording repairs by fourth-century governors in Italy (pp. 24-27), only one records repair to a temple, when in 352/7 a governor of Samnium, who was an exceptionally energetic builder, restored the Capitolium at Histonium.12 For traditionalist Rome and nearby Ostia and Portus there is much more evidence concerning the activities on behalf of the pagan buildings by praefecti urbi and praefecti annonae, though even here the quantity of evidence is far from over­ whelming. In Rome in 357/9 the praefectus urbi Memmius Orfitus repaired a temple of Apollo.13 In 367/8 the praefectus urbi Vettius Praetextatus, soon to be the acknowledged leader of the pagan senators, rebuilt the portico of the Deorum Consentium, at the end of the Forum under the Capitol, and also cleared away private buildings constructed illegally against the temples of the city.14 In 374 the praefectus urbi Claudius Caesarius, also a dedicated pagan (who performed a taurobolium in honour of Cybele during his prefecture), built, or perhaps rebuilt, a large portico attached to the temple of Boni Eventus. 15 At Portus a praefectus annonae, acting (according to the inscription) on imperial orders, restored a temple of Isis in 375/8, and at Ostia as late as 393/4, during the brief pagan revival under the usurper Eugenius, another praefectus annonae restored a temple of Hercules.16 On stylistic grounds it is also possible to attribute the large temple of Saturn at one end of Rome’s Forum to the late Empire, though its inscription merely records that it was built by the Senate after a fire.17 However, alongside such occasional publicly financed 12 CIL ix. 2842 = IL S 5362 (for the man: PLRE I, Maximus 35). 13 CIL vi. 45 = IL S 3222 (for the date: PLRE I, Orfitus 3). 14 Portico: CIL vi. 102 = IL S 4003. The building (restored) stands today: Nash, ii. 241-3. Bloch, ‘New Document’, 203-9, discusses this repair in the light of other evidence of Praetextatus’ religious beliefs. Clearance of temples: Amm. Marc, xxvii. 9 .1 0 . 15 Amm. Marc. xxix. 6. 19 (for the man: PLRE I, Caesarius 7). 16 Portus: Ann. Ep. (1968), no. 86. The repair is described as ordered by the three emperors, with the praefectus annonae merely supervising it (curante). Ostia: Bloch, ‘New Document’; also illustrated in Bloch, ‘Pagan Revival’, figs. 4 and 5. 17 For the building: Nash, ii. 294-8. For the date: Deichmann, Spolien, 11, where he rightly points out that the extensive use of spolia in the temple suggests a post-tetrarchic date.

The End o f the Temples

89

building and repair, there was, even before 382, considerable natural decay and at least a certain amount of spoliation and desecration, though it is impossible to tell how much of this was motivated by religious fanaticism and how much by material greed to seize building-stone and precious contents. Already in 342 Constantius was having to order the praefectus urbi of Rome to preserve the temple buildings outside the walls of the city, in order to retain the entertainments (spectacula) traditionally associated with them.18 In 379/83 in Verona a governor of Venetia et Histria moved a statue to the forum which had long lain, presumably abandoned (diu iacentem), in the Capitolium of the town.19 In 384 the pagan praefectus praetorio Praetextatus was empowered by the Emperor to investigate previous illegal spoliation of the temples.20 In most of Italy after the 380s, if not before, the temples were allowed to rot slowly, or were reused for other purposes or quarried for their materials (see below, and Chapter 10). Conservation was restricted, at the most, to the removal of a few statues for erection elsewhere, as at Verona. In Rome, however, even the abandoned temples were included in the general attempt in late antiquity to maintain the great build­ ings of the classical city. A law of Majorian of 458, addressed to the praefectus urbi, included the temples amongst the public buildings which should not be torn down unless absolutely necessary, and a letter of Cassiodorus written for Theodoric in 510/11 ordered greater care in protecting temples and other public buildings from spoliation, above all of the bronze and lead they contained.21 Both sources make it clear that destruction and spoliation were rife, but also reveal an official attitude that attempted to protect the ancient pagan shrines along with all the other buildings of the city. Indeed, an extraordinary, but reliable, anecdote told by Procopius about the siege of Rome in 537 shows that these efforts had not been wholly unsuccessful. During the siege, a group of Romans attempted secretly to open the doors of the temple of Janus in the Forum, a practice which “ a Th. XVi. 10. 3. 19 CIL V. 3332. 20 Symmachus, Rei. 21. The decree itself does not survive. 21 Majorian: Leg. Nov. ad Theod., Maiorian iv. Theodoric: Variae iii. 31.

90

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

had always been carried out in pagan times, whenever the Republic and Empire were at war. The story includes a description of the temple, which makes it quite clear that its structure, bronze cult-statue, and bronze doors were all in reasonable condition, though the latter were apparently very stiff, since the perpetrators of this act of superstition were only able to pull them ajar.22 These attempts to protect Rome’s temples did not long survive the fall of Ostrogothic power. In the seventh century we find that imperial and papal policy was in favour of spoliation, not conservation. The emperor Heraclius gave per­ mission to Pope Honorius I (625-38) to despoil the great temple of Venus and Rome of its bronze tiles to reroof St. Peter’s, and, during his visit of 664, the emperor Constans II ‘removed everything of bronze that existed for the decoration of the city’, including the bronze tiles on the roof of the Pantheon, despite the fact that this had already been con­ verted into the church of S. Maria ad Martyres.23 The loss of the temples to the classical monumental com­ plexes of Italy was very serious. In all towns, the fora and other public areas contained at least one temple. In very many cases these squares were carefully laid out to be aligned with, and dominated by, a major pagan structure, as, for instance, in the case of most of the imperial fora in Rome and of the fora of Florence, Verona, Luna, and Ostia. Consequently the ruin and spoliation of the temples must have left very un­ sightly gaps in what had once been harmonious and dignified architectural complexes. Furthermore, it was not just the temples that disappeared. Other buildings, either attached to temples or closely associated with the pagan cult, such as the porticoes in Rome of the Deorum Consentium and Boni Eventus mentioned above, were also doomed by the official conversion to Christianity. The only pagan buildings saved were those converted to other purposes, in particular into the churches of the new 22 Procopius, Gothic War, i. 25. 18-25 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 244-7). For a graphic description of the cobwebs and dirt accumulating in Rome’s temples at an earlier date: Jerome, Ep. cvii. 1, ‘auratum squalet Capitolium, fuligine et aranearum telis omnia Romae templa cooperta sunt . . 23 Heraclius: Lib. Pont. i. 323. Constans II: Lib. Pont. i. 343.

The End o f the Temples

91

religion. A great many examples of these still exist, partic­ ularly in southern and central Italy and in Rome: for instance, the cathedral of Syracuse, the Pantheon and S. Lorenzo in Miranda in Rome, and the church of S. Maria in Assisi.24 Un­ fortunately it is not at all certain when, and with what regional variation, the practice of adapting temples into churches became common. No surviving examples outside Rome can be dated with confidence. Possibly the practice arose only quite late in Italy: the earliest documented con­ version I know of is that of a temple of Apollo to a church of S. Andrea by a Bishop Andrew of Fondi, which is men­ tioned in Gregory’s Dialogues and therefore occurred earlier than the end of the sixth century.25 In Rome the first dated example is the famous case of the Pantheon, adapted into the church of S. Maria ad Martyres by Boniface IV (608-15).26 Yet despite this illustrious precedent, the next reliably datable case in Rome is the temple known as that of ‘Fortuna Virilis’, decorated with frescos in 872/82 and almost certainly first converted into the church of S. Maria ad Gradellas at about this same time.27 24 Syracuse (and other Sicilian examples): G. Agnello, / m onum enti bizantini della Sicilia, (Florence, 1957), 8-11. Assisi: M. Cagiano de Azevedo, ‘I “Capitolia” dell’Impero Romano’, A tti della Pontificia Accademia Romana di Archeologia, serie iii, Memorie, 5, (1941), 25 (see also pp. 22 and 24 for Isernia and Rieti). For eastern Mediterranean examples: Claude, pp. 69-71. 25 Gregory, Dialogues, iii. 7. 26 Lib. Pont. i. 317. 27 J. Lafontaine, Peintures médiévales dans le temple dit de la Fortune Virile à R om e (Brussels and Rome, 1959), especially pp. 12-13.

6

The Buildings of Secular Entertainment A swift glance at the evidence for the total disappearance of functioning show-buildings in Italy (the circuses, amphi­ theatres, and theatres) might suggest that, like the temples, they too were slowly starved of funds directly on account of the conversion to Christianity. Certainly the Christian Fathers railed against them with enthusiasm. Tertullian in the early third century wrote a tract specifically attacking them, the De Spectaculis, and Salvian in the early fifth century dedicated most of Book VI of his De Gubernatione Dei to this same theme. Other briefer examples of condemnation, in patristic writings and in the canons of church councils, are extremely frequent in both East and West throughout the third to sixth centuries.12 Ambrose, for instance, in late fourth-century Milan, attacked as prodigus the private spending which supported shows, to be contrasted with the true liberalitas of spending on charity: There are two forms o f largesse: the one generosity [ lib e r a lita s ] , the other prodigal waste [ p r o d ig a e f f u s i o ] . It is generous to house a stranger, clothe a naked man, pay for the release o f captives, and help the needy with money . . . It is prodigal to waste one’s wealth for the sake o f popular fame. This is what is done by those who ruin their inheritance by giving circus games, or even theatrical displays, gladiatorial shows, or beast-fights . . }

A story set at Arles in the 430s shows how this Christian hostility could extend even beyond the entertainments them­ selves to the buildings where they were held. Cassian recorded how Bishop Hilary cured a man hurt while robbing a theatre 1 For Christian attacks: Ville 290-5; Cameron, Circus Factions, 224-5. Both cite further works dealing with the subject in detail, such as H. Jürgens, Pompa diaboli. Die lateinischen Kirchenväter und das antike Theater (Stuttgart, 1972) (= Tübinger Beiträge zur Altertumswissenschaft, 46). 2 Ambrose, De officiis ministrorum, ed. I. G. Krabinger (Tübingen, 1857), ii. 109.

The Buildings o f Secular Entertainment

93

of its marbles in order to decorate a church; both Cassian and Hilary greatly approved this act, described as ‘in a work of faith stripping a seat of luxury in order to decorate a holy building’.3 As we shall see, the gradual disappearance of public enter­ tainments in Italy is as certain as the Fathers’ disapproval of them. By the end of the fourth century they were restricted to a very few towns; gladiatorial shows disappeared entirely in around 400, venationes (wild-beast hunts) around 500, and the surviving circus and theatre with the end of Ostrogothic power. It is tempting to draw a simple causal connection between this undoubted gradual contraction and disappear­ ance, and the disapproval of the Church. Unlike the baths, which we shall examine in the next chapter, the secular and immoral entertainments could not adapt to a new world of Christian charity and patronage, and so perhaps were slowly starved by it. There is, as I hope to show towards the end of this chapter, some truth in this picture, but it is by no means the whole truth. Indeed, to understand that it is not, we need only glance at Constantinople, where, despite the conversion and despite the criticism of the Greek Church Fathers, the circus games continued uninterrupted throughout late antiquity and the early Middle Ages.4 It clearly took more than patristic disapproval to destroy the games, and why this was so is clear if we appreciate two things. Firstly, despite bitter ecclesiastical attacks on all forms of secular entertainments, these latter did not constitute a threat to Christianity of the same kind as did the pagan temples. They threatened not the basic tenets of a jealous faith but the morals of the Christian flock. In these circum­ stances, there was at least some possibility of a coexistence which was wholly denied the temples. Secondly, the games continued to be supported by a powerful secular tradition, upheld by patrons and by spectators, both of whom derived considerable pleasure and benefits from them. In the East this 3 Cassian, Prolegomena in S. Hilarium Arelatensem Episcopum (= Migne, Patrologia Latinay 50), col. 1235. I am grateful to Robin MacPherson for this reference. 4 Cameron, Porphyrius, 255-8. For their survival in other eastern cities until at least the sixth century: Jones, Greek C ity, 254-5.

94

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

tradition lived on uninterrupted, at least in Constantinople itself; in the West it was broken. Once broken, Christianity perhaps played an important part in suppressing any kind of revival, but the example of the East shows that religious change will not do as a sole explanation for the initial break. For this we must turn to the changing political, social, and economic history of late antique Italy and its effect on spectators and patrons! The thoughts and behaviour of spectators can probably be ruled out as a factor straight away. Possible changes of taste amongst spectators may perhaps have affected exactly what type of show was offered, but it seems quite clear that, if the choice had lain with the populace, some sort of public enter­ tainment would have continued throughout the early Middle Ages. Ammianus Marcellinus in the later fourth century described the passionate love of the plebs of Rome for the circus, which occasionally broke out into violence; from the early sixth-century Variae of Cassiodorus we learn that in Ostrogothic times, shortly before Rome’s * entertainment buildings closed for ever, this passion and violence had in no way decreased.5 A sermon of Pope Leo the Great, datable to 440/5, shows that, despite all its troubles and despite ecclesiastical dis­ approval, the Roman populace preferred rather to fill the circus than the churches on the anniversary of the city’s deliverance from further devastation in 410.6 If we are to find change, it will not be with the spectators, but with the patrons who supplied the entertainments. These patrons can conveniently and accurately be divided into four cat­ egories, which must be considered separately: firstly, the local civic donors who provided shows for the provincial towns; secondly, the praetors and quaestors elected to the Senate of Rome and bound to produce games in that city; thirdly, the incoming consuls who provided enter­ tainment at the beginning of the year in Rome or in some other major capital; and, fourthly, the emperors and kings 5 Amm. Marc. xiv. 6. 25-6 and xxviii. 4. 28-31. For riots in 356 following the arrest of a charioteer: xv. 7. 2. Ostrogothic times: Variae i. 27 and 31-3 and vi. 4. 6 Leo, Sermo lxxxiv (= Corpus Christianorum, series Latina, cxxxviii.A, pp. 525-6). I am grateful to Norman James for this reference.

The Buildings o f Secular Entertainment

95

who might provide games for a variety of reasons in a number of their residences. With the first category, the local civic patrons, we are on very familiar ground from Chapter 1 of this book. These were the men and women (local magistrates, patroni, and other benefactors) who in the classical period provided most of the funds to build the theatres and amphitheatres of Italy and to produce the entertainments performed within them, just as they provided the money to build and maintain all the other amenities that adorned even the smallest provincial town.7 In late antiquity, for a variety of reasons explored in Chapter 2, their patronage declined and disappeared. The decline of provincial entertainments must certainly be seen as only one aspect of this more general collapse of traditional local munificence. In the provincial towns of Italy, fourth-century references to the repair of entertainment buildings or to the provision of entertainments are already very scattered and rare, and, as with other categories of amenity, are above all from central Italy, and generally concern the activities of patroni. In 325 an inscription at Amiternum recorded a patronus who had provided theatrical entertainments and gladiatorial shows (munera) on the occasion of his sons’ magistracies and of his own private repair of the aqueduct and baths.8 In 333/7 the towns of Umbria were still maintaining a yearly display of theatrical and gladiatorial entertainment from public funds, and shortly after this date at Hispellum (Spello) a local magistrate and patronus was commemorated who had given splendid gladiatorial and theatrical shows.9 In 364/75 at Velitrae (Velletri) a principalis curiae restored with his own money the amphitheatre, ‘which had collapsed through age, to its former state’.10 In an inscription from Vettona, which 7 For the many theatres and amphitheatres of classical Italy: L. Friedländer, Darstellungen aus der Sittengeschichte R om s, 10th edn. (Leipzig, 1921), iv. 209-17 and 243-9; also, for amphitheatres, Enciclopedia d ’Arte A ntica, ‘Anfiteatro’. Cireuses were much rarer: Friedländer, iv. 241; Enciclopedia d 9A rte A ntica, ‘Circo* adds several (some on poor evidence). For the entertainments themselves: Toller, op. cit. (p. 3 n. 1 above). 8 A n n . Ep. (1937), no. 119. 9 CIL xi. 5265 = IL S 705; CIL xi. 5283 = IL S 6623. 10 CIL X . 6565 = IL S 5632.

96

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

is probably of fourth-century date, a high-ranking aristocrat of Rome is mentioned, who, in honour of his two sons being made patroni of the town, gave gladiatorial and theatrical shows, as well as banquets and grants of food.11 At Noia, possibly in the fourth century, a patronus was described as restorer of all the gladiatorial shows (omnium munerum recreatori).12 It is possible, as with other categories of munificence, that towns favoured by the new fourth-century governors may have been better supplied with public entertainments than others. Three laws in the Theodosian Code deal with the abuse of governors transferring the funds available for spectacula from one town to another (presumably their favoured residence). Two of these laws were promulgated in the East, but one was issued at Trier and addressed to the western praefectus praetorio .13 There is no specific evidence that this concentra­ tion of entertainments was taking place in Italy, but it would fit what we know of the activity of governors in building during this period. Furthermore, the excessive interest of one south Italian governor in entertainments is perhaps attested by a law of 364 addressed to a governor of Lucania et Bruttium ordering him, amonst other things, to spend less attention on winning popularity through the provision of games.14 The scarcity of references to entertainments suggests that in most towns, even in the fourth century, shows of any kind were rare, and that all over provincial Italy they had totally disappeared in the fifth. Indeed, in some places by 300 difficulties in finding patrons to supply entertainments may already have been long-standing. An inscription dated to AD 170 from a small town of Campania, Abella, shows that at this early date gladiatorial shows had at least temporarily disappeared, until a munificent donor revived them.15 11 CIL xi. 5170; Mrozek, 363 (for the date: B. Liou, Praetores Etruriae X V populorum (Brussels, 1969), 59-67). 12 CIL X . 1256 = ILS 6349 (for the date: PLRE I, Clementianus). Munus can have other meanings (e.g. ‘duty’), but here the meaning ‘spectacle* (generally gladiatorial) is probably intended. Another example of a third- or fourth-century patronus setting up games is cited by Harmand, 439, but is best ignored, since it is undated and involves reading a lacuna in the inscription as ludiy for which there is no good justification. 13 C .T K XV. 5. 3 (409) and 9. 2 (409); C. TK xv. 5. 1 (372). 14 C. TK i. 16.9 (364). 15 CIL x. 1211 = ILS 5058.

The Buildings o f Secular Entertainment

97

Certainly the main reason for the disappearance of enter­ tainments in the provincial towns was the reluctance of potential patrons to provide them, but there is also some good evidence to show how the military crisis of the late Empire could have had an effect, by causing all available funds to be diverted from traditional patronage to immediate defensive needs. Admittedly, none of this evidence specifi­ cally relates to Italy, but it is worth considering, since the apparent total disappearance of all local entertainments in Italy after the end of the fourth century may have been because the Visigothic invasions destroyed what little was left of the old traditions. Already at the end of the troubled third century the emperors Diocletian and Maximian addressed a law to a governor Marcellus (perhaps of Caria in Asia Minor), ordering that funds diverted from the provision of games to the repair of city walls should again, on completion of this work, be directed to their original function.16 In 375 at Sirmium materials assembled for a theatre were in an emer­ gency used instead in fortification works.17 The best evidence of all comes from early fifth-century Gaul, where Salvian devoted six chapters of the De Gubernatione Dei to dis­ proving the thesis that the recent disappearance of enter­ tainments in many cities signified a rise in moral standards. Instead, Salvian argued, it merely reflected the extent of barbarian attacks and the consequent shortage of money to be spent on such luxuries: ‘such shows now no longer occur, since they cannot take place on account of the misery and poverty of the present time’.1819 As Salvian and others make clear elsewhere, the games did not lose their charm in times of trouble, and indeed were occasionally held, but the troubles certainly made them more difficult to finance, and so much rarer. 19 16 Justinian, Codex, xi. 42. 1: ‘impensas, quae in certaminis editione eroga­ bantur, ad refectionem murorum transtulisse dicas*. Marcellus may well be the praeses Cariae of the tetrarchie period (for whom PLRE I, Marcellus 9). For a similar diversion of funds in sixth-century Greece: Procopius, Secret H istory, xxvi. 33 (Loeb edition, voi. vi, pp. 314-15). 17 Amm. Marc. xxix. 6 .1 1 . 18 Salvian, De Gubernatione Deiy ed. G. Lagarrigue (Paris, 1975), vi. 39-45 (= Sources chrétiennes, no. 220). 19 For their continued appeal: Salvian, De Gubernatione Dei, vi. 82-9 (the

98

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

In the case of the second group of patrons, the quaestors and praetors elected to membership of the Roman Senate, the evidence is much more abundant and reaches right up to Ostrogothic times. These officials, or rather their families (since they themselves were normally adolescents), were by law obliged to provide games in Rome on election, and were also free to contribute far above the legal minimum if they wished to. From the late fourth and early fifth century there is good evidence that some rich aristocrats in Rome embraced this duty with enthusiasm. A large number of the letters of Symmachus are concerned entirely with his efforts to ensure the splendour of the games given to celebrate the quaestorship and praetorship of his son in 393 and 401.20 In all of these letters the old-fashioned virtues of traditional munifi­ cence are clear, and in one of them Symmachus stated very explicitly what encouraged him to seek out strange animals, such as crocodiles, to display to the people: the example of what others had done and his own innate zeal {animositas).21 A famous passage by the Greek historian Olympiodorus re­ cords the amounts spent by three Roman senators of the period 401-25 on the praetorian games of their sons: the same Symmachus, described as being only moderately rich for a senator, is said to have spent 2,000 pounds of gold on his son’s games of 401, a certain Olybrius 1,200 pounds in 424, and a certain Maximus an extraordinary 4,000 pounds at some unspecified date within this period.22 Writing of an earlier period, Ammianus Marcellinus included a reference to the magnificent games and largesse offered on the occasion of the praetorship of Volusianus, praefectus urbi in 365: ‘When he was praetor he provided splendid games and very rich largesse.’23 All these men were lavish spenders, and, if case of Trier cited below, p. 106 n. 51). For other examples of people flocking to games despite the barbarian threat: P. Courcelle, Histoire littéraire des grandes invasions germaniques y (Paris, 1948), 44, 65-6, and 104. 20 See McGeachy, 104-9; Jones, L R E t 560-1; Seeck, introduction to his edition of Symmachus’s letters, pp. lxxi-lxxii. 21 Symmachus, Ep. ix. 151: ‘me crocodillos et pleraque peregrina civibus exhibere et aliorum hortantur exempla et propria conpellit animositas’. 22 Olympiodorus, frag. 44 (= C. Müller, ed., Historicorum graecorum frag­ menta, iv (Paris, 1851), 67-8). 23 Amm. Mare, xxvii. 3. 6.

The Buildings o f Secular Entertainment

99

Olymp io doni s’ figures bear any credence, eager to let it be known exactly how deep they had dug into their pockets. In 384 it was even necessary to legislate to restrict the splendour of the gifts given out at such games in Rome; the praefectus urbi of the time, Symmachus, expressed the gratitude of the Senate at this legislation, which would prevent poorer senators from ruining themselves in emulation of the largesse of the very rich.24 In fact, despite the gratitude he expressed in 384 as praefectus urbi and therefore leader of the Senate, Sym­ machus later tried to get round this law for his own son’s games by seeking special permission to give out silks.25 After 425 evidence of similar enthusiasm in the provision of senatorial games is lacking, but it is impossible to say with certainty when the tradition finally died. The inscriptions studied by Chastagnol in the Colosseum show that senators were still eager to keep their reserved seats until the late fifth century, though this does not necessarily mean they were keen to pay for the games they watched. That some of them may have been, is suggested by an inscription of 484 recording a repair to the Colosseum after an earthquake, by a praefectus urbi with his own money [sumptu proprio)—an extremely late example of private repair to a secular building.26 However, by Ostrogothic times all enthusiasm to spend oh praetorian games seems to have gone, for Boethius wrote in his Con­ solation o f Philosophy, in a passage that contrasts markedly with Olympiodorus’ statement, ‘the praetorship was once a great source of power, but is now an empty title and a heavy burden on senators’ income’.27 This eventual disappearance by the early sixth century of the zealous spending recorded by Olympiodorus, Symmachus, and Ammianus Marcellinus was perhaps partly the result of the severe disruptions of the fifth century, which certainly badly dented senatorial incomes. But it was probably mainly caused by an awakening, even in the ranks of the highly con­ servative senatorial aristocracy, of the awareness, expressed by Boethius, that traditional largesse was not worth the rewards it brought, particularly when high-ranking civil 24 C. Th. XV. 9 .1 ; Symmachus, Rei. 8. 25 Jones, LRE, 560. 26 Chastagnol, Sénat, 24-5. Inscription of 484; CIL vi. 1716a, b, c = IL S 5635 (for the date: Chastagnol, Sénat, 44). 27 Boethius, Consol. Phil. iii. 4.

100

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

servants could by imperial adlectio achieve senatorial rank without ever undergoing the burdens of the praetorship.28 Indeed, even in the later fourth century the situation was not all as rosy as the evidence we have looked at so far would suggest. It is clear that some of the richer Italian senators normally resident in Rome were spending happily in the best traditions of classical munificence; but other new senators, in particular provincials who had little to gain from courting the Roman populace, seem already to have been seeking to acquire senatorial status without even supplying the mini­ mum cash for games required by law. The section of the Theodosian Code entitled ‘De Praetoribus et Quaestoribus’ is concerned largely with the reluctance of these officials to supply the games they were obliged to give in Rome or Constantinople. Many of these laws apply specifically to the eastern Senate, but several are addressed to the praefectus urbi of Rome, showing that this was not just an eastern problem.29 Indeed, this picture is supported by references in the letters of Symmachus to similar evasions. In 384, when praefectus urbi, he began an investigation into fraudulent methods used by new senators to avoid paying for games, and in 396 he wrote of a year in Rome ‘almost empty of shows’ and even singled out for praise a praetor who had given games cheaply, but had at least come to Rome in person to give them.30 As we shall see when examining the next category of patrons, the consuls, there is little evidence that religious scruples affected aristocratic reluctance or willingness to supply games. Indeed, if we examine in detail the informa­ tion available on the praetorian games, we also find little to suggest that there was a close correlation between paganism and lavish spending, and between Christianity and reluctance to spend. Of the four lavish spenders on praetorian games mentioned by Ammianus Marcellinus and Olympiodorus, two, Volusianus and Symmachus, were certainly dedicated *• Jones, L R E , 541. 29 C. Th. vi. 4. 1-34. Laws 2 ,4 ,7 ,1 7 ,and 21 (all concerned with the provision of games) are addressed to the praefectus urbi of Rome. The office of quaestor is not recorded after the very early fifth century, but that of praetor is known up to Ostrogothic times. On all these matters: Jones, L R E , 532, 537-9, and 1224 n. 24. 30 Symmachus, Rei. 23. 2 andJEp. ix. 126.

The Buildings o f Secular Entertainment

101

pagans.31 The other two, unfortunately, are more difficult to identify with certainty. One of them, Maximus, was perhaps the father of Petronius Maximus, Emperor in 455 (who himself would have been too young to be the father concerned), and unfortunately about his religious beliefs we know nothing.32 However, the fourth man, Olybrius, was probably Faltonius Probus Alypius, praefectus urbi in 391, who is very likely to have been a Christian, since his brother is recorded as such and since his mother was the Christian poet Proba.33 As we have seen, the evidence of Boethius shows that the force of law retained at least some spending, however reluc­ tant, on senatorial games right up until Ostrogothic times. But after the horrors of the Gothic War and of the Byzantine imposition of power, even this limited and legally enforced spending ceased. Although the Roman Senate is mentioned in Justinian’s Pragmatic Sanction, which was set out as the basis for a renewed administration in Italy, it never again seems to have functioned as an effective body, and after 600 fades entirely from the records.34 With the demise of the Senate, of course, also died the senatorial games. The devastation in the ranks of the senatorial aristocracy caused by the Gothic Wars, and the demise of the old adminis­ tration soon after, were also what eventually destroyed the third category of patronage we are to consider: the games offered by the consuls on taking office at the beginning of the year. In fact, because the consulate was so often held by a member of the imperial or royal family, this category overlaps considerably with my fourth and final one. However, it is essential briefly to treat apart the activities of consuls not of the ruling house. 31 For Volusianus: PLRE I, Volusianus 5; Bloch, ‘Pagan Revival*, 205. 32 Chastagnol, Fastes, 283. 33 Seeck in PW9 i, cols. 2201-2; Sundwall, Weströmische, 47 no. 18;PLRE I, Alypius 13. There are problems with this identification, since it is not certain that the praefectus urbi of 391 would have been alive to supply games for his son’s praetorship in 424 (the date specified by Olympiodorus). For Alypius* brother and mother: PLRE I, Olybrius 3 and Proba 2. His father’s religion is unknown (PLRE I, Celsinus 6). 34 E. Stein, ‘La Disparition du Sénat à la fin du VIe siècle', Bulletin de la classe des lettres et des sciences morales et politiques de VAcadémie Royale de Belgique, sér. 5, 25 (1939). Also Richards, 246-8.

102

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

The evidence for the consular games in the fourth to sixth centuries is scattered and various. Much of it consists of poetic descriptions of games in action, which are very infor­ mative for the type of entertainment supplied, but for our purposes less useful than detailed evidence of how much was spent by whom, such as Olympiodorus provides for the praetorian games.35 However, the evidence that exists is still enough to show that, of all forms of private munificence on games, the tradition of consular largesse survived the best. In particular, there is a glowing account of such largesse by Boethius in the Consolation o f Philosophy, the very work in which he dismissed the sixth-century praetorship as an expensive burden. Here, when Philosophy wishes to remind the imprisoned Boethius of the extreme good fortune he has enjoyed in life, she speaks of the day his two sons were raised to the consulate together (in 522). The climax of her account describes the scene at their inaugural games, when Boethius distributed largesse seated between the two consuls: *. . . when, seated in the circus between the two consuls, you satisfied with triumphant largesse the expectations of the surrounding populace’.36 To complement Boethius’ proud statement is the nearly contemporary ‘Formula of the Consulate’ in the Variae of Cassiodorus, written for the Ostrogothic king Theodoric, in which the incoming consul is reminded of his duty to spend in his term of office: It is right for consuls to be generous [ m a g n a n i m o s ] . You who have decided to have public favour by your largesse need not consider the expense . . . F o r other officials, even if they do not request it, are sometimes appointed. But consuls are only selected if they desire the honour; so that only you who know yourselves to be equal to the expense achieve this office of largesse.37

That Cassiodorus was not being over-optimistic nor Boethius unique in his pride and preparedness to spend is 35 The best example is Claudian, De consulatu Manlii Theodori, lines 282-340, which describes the racing, wrestling, athletics, venationes, theatricals, music, acrobatics, naumachia, and other displays put on in 399 to celebrate the consulate of Theodorus (a prominent Christian: PLRE I, Theodorus 27). 36 Boethius, Consol. Phil. ii. 3. Boethius later in the book (ii. 7) attacks the whole basis of worldly fame and reputation; but this was clearly not an attitude he shared in 522. 31 Variae \ i. 1.

The Buildings o f Secular Entertainment

103

shown by the continuous series of fifth- and early sixthcentury ivory diptychs commissioned and given out by in­ coming consuls to celebrate their inauguration. These often depict the incumbent with hand raised to start his games, or a scene showing the entertainments themselves, or money for largesse being poured out of bags by attendants.38 Of course, in terms of power, the fifth- and sixth-century consulate was yet another empty façade that deceived no one. In the ‘Formula of the Consulate’, mentioned above, its rela­ tion with Gothic royal power is described as: ‘we have the work of the consulate, you the enjoyment of its prestige . . . we, with the help of God, rule; we consult, and your name marks the year’. But, unlike other civic and senatorial offices, its prestige remained very high, carrying with it, above all, immortality through the naming of the year after the two consuls. Evidently this prestige was still thought well worth paying for. Only with the Gothic Wars do both consulate and consular games disappear. The last consul in the West was appointed by Queen Amalasuntha in 534, and the conquering Greeks seem to have made no effort to revive an office that was soon to die out in Constantinople.39 The continuing popularity of the consulate and its games shows quite clearly that, despite the attacks of Ambrose and others on all spending on entertainments, much of the sena­ torial aristocracy was in practice quite prepared to continue with the old traditions as long as they felt them worth while. Religious scruples may have affected a few extremists, like the late fourth-century Christian senator Pammachius, whom it is indeed hard to imagine giving games with enthusiasm, but do not seem to have affected the majority of senators.40 For these men the coexistence of two traditions, a new Christian one and an older secular one, was possible, until a dramatic military, economic, and political crisis finally destroyed all the traditions of senatorial life, and the very Senate itself. 38 R. Delbrück, Die Consulardiptych en und verwandte Denkmäler, (BerlinLeipzig, 1929) (= Studien zur spätantiken Kunstgeschichte, 2), nos. 6 (AD 480), 7 (AD 487), 32 (AD 530), 37 and 56-8 (all of early fifth century). 39 Jones, L R E , 532-3. 40 For Pammachius: PLRE I, Pammachius. On senators’ love of old, even pagan, traditions, see also H. Chadwick, Boethius, (Oxford, 1982), 12-15.

104

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

Nowhere is the continuing, though awkward, coexistence of both a Christian and a traditional attitude to the games clearer than amongst the fourth category of patrons we have to deal with, the emperors, kings, and their families. For these patrons, as we shall see, the games were an important part of the ceremonial of rule and were expected of a ruler. Yet, at the same time, Christianity and the Church also made demands. Three sections of the Theodosian Code, the De Spectaculis, the De Maiuma, and the De Scaenicis, deal for the most part with the tightrope the emperors walked between the demands of Christian morality and the need to supply the public with the entertainment it required.41 The result was generally some sort of compromise: for instance, in 425 all spectacles were banned on Sundays and on church feast-days, and in 396 the licentious aquatic display, the maiuma, was declared legal, but only if it was decent.42 On the other side of the coin, in 342 Constantius ordered the praefectus urbi of Rome to preserve the temple buildings (though no mention is made of their cults) outside the walls of the city, in order to retain the entertainments associated with them.43 Entertainments were expected of,-and were duly provided by, emperors and kings on a variety of different occasions. For instance, in 395, on the day before he died, Theodosius presided at games in the circus at Milan, held to celebrate his victory over the usurper Eugenius.44 In 396, to mark a consulate, Honorius gave a venatio in Milan with beasts from Africa, and in 404 provided various entertainments in Rome to mark a later consulate, and also probably to celebrate victory over the Goths in the preceding year.45 Sidonius Apollinaris, in a poem describing the career of Consentius of Narbonne, gives an account of circus racing in Rome, held by Valentinian III (425-55) in honour of one 41 C. Th. XV. 5, 6, and 7. 42 C. Th, XV. 5. 5 (425) and 6. 1 (396). For the maiuma- Jones, L R E , 1021; G. Traversali, Gli spettacoli in acqua nel teatro tardo-antico (Rome, 1960). 43 C. Th. xvi. 10. 3. 44 Socrates, Historia Ecclesiastica, ed. R. Hussey, 3 vols. (Oxford, 1853), V.26. 45 Vita S. Am brosii, ed. and trans. M. Pellegrino (Roma, 1961), c. 34; Stilicho took the opportunity to try and expose a certain Cresconius to the beasts. Claudian, De sexto consulatu Honorii Augusti, lines 611-39.

The Buildings o f Secular Entertainment

105

of his consulates.46 In 500, to celebrate the anniversary of his rule, Theodoric gave circus games in Rome, and in 519 his newly acquired son-in-law Eutharic gave splendid entertain­ ments in both Rome and Ravenna, mainly to mark his con­ sulate, but also probably to celebrate his marriage.47 The games were important to emperors and kings, partly because they enjoyed them, but above all because they served as a public display of power, wealth, and prestige, and as a symbol of the benefits the ruler brought the populace. It was as such that they continued to be useful to emperors in the East, who maintained them in Constantinople throughout the early Middle Ages.48 This role of the games in political display in late antique Italy is best seen under the Ostrogoths, whose efforts in this field were those of an insecure barbarian tribe trying very hard to prove that they were worthy to lord it over the ancient heart of Empire. When Theodoric gave games at Rome, the Anonymus Valesianus commented, as no doubt it was hoped he would, that ‘even by the Romans he was called a Trajan or a Valentinian, whose times he imitated’.49 Similarly, Theodoric’s minister Cassiodorus closed his brief Chronica in 519 with an account of the games given in Rome and Ravenna in honour of the joint consulate of the eastern emperor Justin and of Theodoric’s son-in-law Eutharic, and 46 Sidonius Apollinaris, Carmen xxiii, lines 307-11: Ianus forte suas bifrons Kalendas anni tempora circinante Phoebo sumendas referebat ad curules, mos est Caesaris hic, die bis uno (privatos vocitant) parare ludos. These lines clearly refer to consular games, since they refer to officials taking up office on 1 January (i.e. the consuls). Taken alone, the lines could be taken to mean that the emperor customarily paid for two races of the consular games, even for non-imperial consuls. However, it is clear later, from line 423, that the emperor himself is presiding, and that the games are therefore being given by Valentinian to celebrate one of his own consulates. 47 Anon. Vales, c. 67 (p. 324). Cassiodorus, Chronica, û. 519 (p. 161). 48 Cameron, Circus Factions, 181-3 and 261-70; id .,Porphyrins, 248-52. For ceremonial reasons, late antique circuses and palaces were often built side by side: M. Vickers, ‘The Hippodrome at Thessaloniki*, Journal o f Roman Studies, 62 (1972), 25-32 (especially 31-2). Mango, 344-50, points out that, although the games survived in Constantinople, they came to be held on only a very few days a year; they had ceased to be a true sport and had become almost purely ceremonial in their function. 49 Anon. Vales., c. 60 (p. 322).

106

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

was careful to state that the ambassador from the eastern court (yet another Symmachus) was amazed at the opulence of Ostrogothic largesse and display: ‘even the eastern ambas­ sador Symmachus was amazed’.50 When Totila captured Rome for the second time in 549, although in the middle of a campaign, he at once gave circus games (perhaps the last ever held in Rome). Though our source for this event, Procopius, does not explain Totila’s motive, it is almost certain that this was a noble gesture, aimed at demonstrating to friends and enemies alike the benefit of renewed Gothic power over the city.51 Of all the barbarian settlers, the Ostrogoths were certainly the most Roman in their style of propaganda, but in patron­ izing the games they were not unique. From the evidence of poetry it is clear that in Vandal Africa the circus above all, but also the amphitheatre and theatre, remained functioning and popular.52 Procopius in the mid sixth century wrote of the Franks viewing horse-races at Arles, the late Roman capital of Gaul. That this was probably intended for political display, and not just for pleasure, is suggested by the fact that Procopius writes of it in the same sentence as he de­ nounces the new practice of King Theudebert (534-48) of minting old coins in his own, not the emperor’s, name.53 Because the Ostrogoths considered the entertainments so important, they devoted a great deal of effort and money to maintaining them, particularly in Rome, but also in their other capitals, as is clear above all from the Variae of Cassiodorus. Several letters refer to the circus in Rome, and deal principally with the trouble caused by the factions.54 For 50 Cassiodorus, Chronica, a.519 (p. 161). 51 Procopius, Gothic War, iii. 37. 4 (Loeb edition, voi. v, pp. 12-13). Compare the similar gesture of the Persian Chosroes on capturing Apamea: Claude, 77-8, with other examples. It is in the light of this tradition that we must understand the request to the emperor by the nobles of Trier for games after one of the sacks of the city in the early fifth century. Salvian, De Gubernatione Dei, vi. 85, attacked this as a piece of immoral idiocy, but such games may have been intended to show both citizens and barbarians that Trier was still Roman, and still cared for by its emperor. 52 Collected by C. Courtois, Les Vandales et l'Afrique (Paris, 1955), 228 n. 5. See also Procopius, Vandal War, ii. 6. 7 (Loeb edition, voi. ii, pp. 256-7): ‘and passed their time . . . in theatres and hippodromes . . . ’. 53 Procopius, Gothic War, iii. 33. 5 (Loeb edition, voi. iv, pp. 438-9). 54 Variae i. 20, 27, 31— 3 ; iii. 51; vi. 4. See also pp. 105-6 nn. 49-51 above.

The Buildings o f Secular Entertainment

107

Rome there is also evidence of a continuing tradition of amphitheatre and theatre; the former I shall be considering later, the latter is attested by three letters of the Variae, of which one refers to the State funding of shows and another to Theodoric’s repayments to Symmachus of the money he spent privately to restore the theatre of Pompey.55 There is also reference to entertainments at Milan, for, although it was no longer a regular royal residence after 402, the city remained the largest of the Po plain and, unlike the nearby royal city of Pavia, was equipped with a circus. Here Theodoric inter­ vened to support the rights of the charioteers, and here the Ostrogoths appointed a regular tribunus voluptatum to look after the shows.56 At the royal residence of Pavia Theodoric built, or restored, an amphitheatre.57 Strangely, there is least evidence of all for the main royal residence, Ravenna, but we do know that in 519 Eutharic repeated here the splendid shows he had put on in Rome to mark his consulate.58 Little or none of this royal and imperial activity and spend­ ing survived the fall of the Ostrogothic kingdom and the Lombard invasion of most of the peninsula in 568. The Lombard rulers, as we shall see in Chapters 8 and 9 on palaces and city walls, retained the essential framework of public buildings and services needed for a continued townbased administration, but were apparently little interested in the Roman trimmings provided by the Ostrogoths. Conse­ quently, there is no certain evidence of their patronizing the games. Indeed, only for one king, Agilulf (591-616), does it seem even possible on the meagre evidence available that he provided public entertainments. The Roman style of his pre­ tensions is shown by two archaeological finds, the so-called ‘helmet of Agilulf’ and a series of brick-stamps from Milan. 55 Variae vii. 10; ix. 21 (referring to royal grants); iv. 51 (theatre of Pompey: see also p. 44 n. 32 above). 56 Variae iii. 39; v. 25. Variae vii. 109the Formula Tribuni Voluptatum, how­ ever, probably refers to a similar official in Rome: though not mentioned in the Notitia Dignitatum, a tribunus voluptatum is referred to in C. TK i. 19 (Chastagnol, Prefecture, 5 and id., Sénat, 22). For the circus of Milan: Storia di Milano, i. 530-5. 57 See p. 115 n. 80 below. 58 See p. 106 n. 50 above. Also a letter of Felix IV (526-30) criticized the clergy of Ravenna because ‘Pervenit ad nos, aliquos de clero spectaculum interesse, que res ita crudelis est, . . .* (Agnellus, R R J L S S 170). I owe this reference, which may be evidence of an amphitheatre at Ravenna to Tom Brown.

108

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

In 604, in clear imitation of Byzantine ceremonial use of the hippodrome, he had his son proclaimed co-ruler in the circus of Milan in the presence, amongst others, of Frankish envoys.59 Although our source for this ceremony, Paul the Deacon, does not mention them, it is not at all impossible that this, or other, occasions were also marked by games. However, what evidence we have, suggests that Agilulf was exceptional amongst Lombard rulers, and there is not even a shred of evidence to suggest that other kings gave public entertainments. Nor indeed do the Byzantine invaders sent by Justinian, and the subsequent Byzantine administration based on Ravenna, seem to have been very interested in providing spectacles for the people of Italy, which for the first time since the establishment of the Empire was treated by em­ perors as a mere province, and a beleaguered one at that. There is, for instance, no evidence at all of any games being given in Rome after Totila’s show of 549. It is possible that a limited amount of public entertain­ ment was provided in the northern Byzantine capital of Ravenna. If so, it would probably have been paid for out of a public fund financed from taxation owed to the central government, as is known to have happened in the case of some major provincial towns in the East.60 That something similar occurred in northern Italy is suggested by a story from late seventh- or eighth-century Byzantine Sicily, in which horse-racing in Catania in the presence of the governor plays an important part in the life of the town’s saintly Bishop Leo.61 But there is unfortunately no good direct evidence of similar public entertainments continuing in our areas of mainland Italy. The only reference to them that I know of is an account, in the ninth-century historian Agnellus, of Ravenna in mourning in the early years of the eighth 59 Hist. Lang. iv. 30. For the helmet and brick-stamps see p. 170 nn. 50 and 51 below. 60 Cameron, Circus Factions, 219. 61 V. Latysev, Hagiographica Graeca Inedita (St. Petersburg, 1914), 23-4. For a Latin version of the life: Acta Sanctorum, Februarii iii. 226. See also G. Da Costa-Louillet, ‘Saints de Sicile et d’Italie méridionale aux VIIIe, IXe et Xe siècles’, B yzantion, 29-30 (1959-60), 89-95. Catania, unlike the nearby Byzantine capital of Syracuse, did have a Roman circus: Enciclopedia dell9Arte A ntica, ‘Circo’. I owe these references to Tom Brown.

The Buildings o f Secular Entertainment

109

century, where, among other sad signs of disaster, he mentions that ‘the baths closed and the public shows [spectacula] were stopped’.62 However, there is one problem in taking this to refer to public spectacles in early eighth-century Ravenna. The wording of this part of Agnellus’ account is suspiciously close to the account in Eusebius’ Vita Constantini of Rome in mourning in 337 at the news of Constantine’s death, and may possibly reflect more an early fourth-century Roman reality than one in early eighth-century Ravenna.63 In the preceding pages I have explained the decline of patronage of the traditional public entertainments in purely secular terms. I have shown that it is unnecessary to invoke the conversion to Christianity as a reason for their decline, and that with kings and senators, until Ostrogothic times, both the traditions and usefulness of the games were strong enough to coexist with ecclesiastical hostility. However, having dismissed Christian opposition as a primary cause of the decline of the games, it is now important to cor­ rect the balance by looking briefly at the subject in a broader perspective. For although secular, not religious, change destroyed the various traditional forms of entertainmentpatronage in Italy, it remains true that the incompatibility of the Roman games with Christian morality was an essential ingredient in their disappearance. This was not because Christianity directly destroyed them, but because, in the face of decline for secular reasons, the games were unable to ac­ quire a new lease of life under the guise of ‘Christian charity’. As we shall see in the next chapter, patronage of baths and gifts of food and money could fairly easily slip from a classical tradition of munificence to a Christian tradition of charity, and so be sure of a continued, if transformed, existence in a world where the motivation for traditional secular patronage had disappeared. This transition was M Agnellus, MGH, 362 c. 128. 63 Ibid.: ‘Clausa sunt balnea, cessaverunt spectacula publica, mercatores retexerunt pedes, oppilaverunt caupones tabernas, nondinatoris reliquerunt negotia, . . Eusebius, Vita Constantini (translation in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, NS vol. i): ‘The baths and markets were closed, the public spectacles, and all other recreations in which men of leisure are accustomed to indulge, were interrupted.’

110

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

denied to the games, decried as immoral by the Church Fathers. A glance at early medieval Rome will show the importance of this simple fact. Here, with the fall of Ostrogothic power and the collapse of the traditional senatorial administration, the age-old secular motives for giving games disappeared, and control of all aspects of the administration passed increasingly to the bishop of Rome. In Chapters 7 and 9 we shall find him duly repairing the city’s aqueducts and fortifications to pro­ vide for the needs of his flock, but, not surprisingly, we do not find Gregory the Great and his successors presiding at circus games. Even in less extreme cases than papal Rome the games were vulnerable, and could only survive where secular tradi­ tion was strong and uninterrupted. In the East it was, and the games did survive: the ceremonial of the emperor at his games continued throughout the early Middle Ages, alongside the growing Christian elements of imperial rule (indeed some of these latter were even absorbed into circus ceremonial).64 But even in the East we can see that the entertainments were in a sensitive position, and needed powerful uninterrupted tradi­ tion to shelter them: as Claude has pointed out, it is certainly significant that, whereas Justinian built entertainment buildings, as well as churches, in the great old cities of Constantinople and Antioch, at his new foundation of Justiniana Prima he built only churches.65 Where there was no tradition, or where the tradition had disappeared, in the new climate of Christian kingship it would be considered unnecessary, strange, and immoral for a ruler to introduce or reintroduce the secular entertainments. This, I think, explains why the games disappeared in the West: the secular tradition of giving entertainments had, for a variety of reasons unconnected with religion, become fitful and weak, and in these circumstances bowed out to a constant and growing Christian ideal of how kingship should be dis­ played. Gregory of Tours, writing in late sixth-century Gaul, described the accession of Maurice Tiberius in Constantinople 44 Cameron, Circus Factions, 152 and 261-70; Cameron,Porphyrins, 248-52; R. Guilland, ‘Etudes sur l ’Hippodrome de Byzance, VIT, Byzantinoslavica, 28 (1967), 262-71. 45 Claude, 75.

The Buildings o f Secular Entertainment

111

in 582, and included without comment a brief account of the Emperor’s acclamation in the circus and his distribution there of largesse; yet, when King Chilperic in 577 ordered circuses to be built at Soissons and Paris to entertain the people, Gregory poured scorn on this, as yet another display by a king with excessive, ill-directed, and ludicrous classical pretensions.66 For Gregory the ancient customs of Constan­ tinople were not applicable in the world of late sixth-century Gaul; it was one thing to continue an age-old tradition, quite another to try and revive one. This attitude helped keep the entertainments, once dead, firmly under the soil. Conse­ quently in Italy, if they survived at all, the entertainments continued only in Byzantine areas, and even here they ended with the eighth-century Lombard, Frankish, and Arab invasions. Before leaving the subject of Christian influence, or lack of it, on the decline of the games, one more thorny aspect of it needs to be tackled. This is the question of whether Christian hostility, without destroying the whole edifice, managed to eliminate one limited area of entertainment—the bloody shows of gladiators and beasts given in the amphitheatres. These two forms of entertainment certainly did disappear entirely in the Empire, in around 400 in the case of the gladiatorial shows, and in the years after 500 in the case of the animal-hunts (venationes); however, there are two basic problems in attributing their disappearance to Christian in­ fluence. Firstly, the Fathers very rarely singled out the shows of the amphitheatre for particular criticism, but rather con­ demned all spectacles as immoral, so that it is hard to see why, in the face of Christian hostility, gladiatorial and beastshows alone of all the entertainments should disappear.67 Secondly, the most likely way that the Church could have destroyed the traditions of the amphitheatre, unless they were already dead or moribund for some other reason, was through imperial legislation. Yet there is evidence both that 66 Gregory of Tours, Hist. Franc. vi. 30 and v. 17 (for other aspects of Chil­ peric’s theological and classical pretensions: v. 44). Games may not have been held in this part of Gaul at least since the fall of Syagrius in 486. As Procopius makes clear (see p. 106 n. 53 above), the tradition was stronger in the south, and we do not know when it died out here. 67 For the Fathers: Ville; Cameron, Circus Factions, 216-17.

112

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

earlier imperial legislative attempts to stamp out undesirable forms of amusement (like the pantomimes) had been doomed to failure, and that all known late antique legislation specif­ ically aimed against gladiators and venationes was also either ineffectual or was never even intended to have a broad appli­ cation. It used to be argued that imperial legislation, referred to by historians of the period as enacted in the years about 400, finally put a stop to gladiatorial games in Rome, at a date when the gladiators had probably largely disappeared else­ where in the Empire. However, there is evidence from a poem of Prudentius that gladiatorial games were still being held in Rome in 402/3, and even evidence from senatorial medallions (the contomiates) that they continued as late as the reign of Valentinian III in the 430s.68 Because of this, the theory that Christian-inspired legislation in about 400 put an end to Rome’s gladiatorial shows is currently out of favour, and scholars have recently looked for some other slower cause for their disappearance in most of the Empire by the end of the fourth century and in Rome by the end of the fifth century, if not before. Ville, who studied the question in detail, sug­ gested economic stringency, since gladiators were expensive to train and did not last long in performance; however, as Cameron has pointed out, this is not a very satisfactory argument, since the expensive chariot-races and venationes (involving the capture, transport, and destruction of exotic animals, did not disappear in the same period.69 Cameron, while doubting Ville, still steered clear of legally enforced Christian influence, and suggested ‘a genuine change of popular taste’.70 I find this too vague and difficult an argu­ ment to accept, in the absence of any firm evidence to support it. In fact, for lack of any truly satisfactory rival interpreta­ tion, I think on balance that gladiators really did disappear as a result of the influence of the Church: perhaps in part through direct influence on patrons (and just possibly on spectators), but perhaps mainly indirectly through more rigid imperial enforcement of existing legislation, or the enactment 68 For all this: Ville, 317-31 ; Chastagnol, Sénat, 20-2. 69 Ville, 332-5; Cameron, Circus Factions, 216-17.

79 Ibid.

The Buildings o f Secular En tertainment

113

of other unrecorded laws. Two facts make this picture seem more probable, since they go at least part of the way to eliminating the two basic objections raised above: that the Church was not interested in eliminating the gladiators alone, and that the emperors lacked the power to enforce legislation of this kind. Firstly, at least one Christian thinker in early fifth-century Rome, Prudentius, did not simply issue a blanket condemnation of all entertainments, but considered gladi­ atorial shows to be uniquely horrible, and therefore urged a compromise whereby in the amphitheatre only venationes were to be allowed: ‘Now let the hateful arena be satisfied with beasts alone, and let no murder be played out with bloody weapons.’71 Secondly, in contrast to the situation under the early Empire, when legislation against the pan­ tomimes was notoriously unsuccessful, the late emperors in fact had a good chance of enforcing legislation about enter­ tainments. This was because they now had to deal only with a very limited number of patrons (themselves and a restricted circle of senatorial aristocrats), on whom pressure by word of mouth or legislation could very easily be brought to bear, which was not the case with the myriad civic patrons of the first centuries a d . Bearing these two facts in mind, it is possible to envisage an ecclesiastical climate particularly interested in destroying the gladiatorial shows, and a situa­ tion in which this might have been brought about through a sympathetic emperor.72 By contrast, at least in the West, it seems very unlikely that Christian influence can explain the end of the venationes in the years after 500. In the East, these were supposedly banned by a law of the emperor Anastasius in 498. However, even in Constantinople this law seems to have been very slow to have an effect, since venationes are referred to up until 537. 71 Prudentius, Contra Sym m achum , ii. lines 1128-9. This poem, of 402/3, is our source for gladiatorial games in the city at this late date (for these see also ibid, i, lines 379-85, and ii, 1109-32). 72 As Averil Cameron has pointed out to me, Prudentius’s poem of 402/3, with its hope for an end to gladiatorial shows, could in fact refer to an imperial decision recently made. The only other ‘firm* evidence of gladiators after 400, the contomiates, could be a nostalgic record of past practice—in which case, the legislation that stamped out gladiatorial shows could after all be that referred to in around 400.

114

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

Chastagnol resolved the problem of the recorded law of Anastasius and these conflicting later references to beastshows, by suggesting that all the spectacles after 498 were no longer bloody venationes, involving the hunting and killing of animals, but instead peaceful displays, above all with acro­ bats eluding animals in the arena.73 His arguments are based on the evidence of the representations on eastern consular diptychs of 506 and 517, which show scenes of this kind.74 However, Chastagnol does not state that one of these diptychs, of 506, also unambiguously shows venatores killing lions, nor does he sufficiently stress that our last reference to beastshows, in a Novel of 537, refers quite clearly to venationes of the traditional kind.75 Also, as Cameron has pointed out, it is not at all clear whether the ending of the traditional type of venatio, and the replacement of it by these strange and dan­ gerous acrobatic excitements, was really designed to save human life.76 It is all too possible that it was instead designed to save the lives of expensive animals, and that the risks for human performers remained. This seems clear from a letter of Cassiodorus, Variae v. 42, often cited as a condemnation of traditional venationes, which, though it does refer to hunts­ men in the arena (venatores), describes at length acrobats of the type shown on the diptychs. What is important is that the letter condemns this form of entertainment, just as it con­ demns conventional venationes, and makes it quite clear both that all this was very dangerous, and that the thrill of the audience was still to see whether the venatores or acrobats would be mauled by the beasts they taunted.77 Bearing these facts in mind, it seems certain that Anastasius’ legislation of 498 did not bring about radical change, even in the East. Certainly, after 537 the beast-shows no longer 73 Chastagnol, Sénat, 60-2. Anastasius’ law is known only through references in the historians of his reign. 74 R. Delbrück, op. cit. (p. 103 n. 38 above), nos. 9, 11, 12, 20, and 21. 75 Delbrück, no. 9. Also conveniently illustrated in Brown, fig. 98. Justinian, Novellae 105 c. 1: ‘cum bestiis pugnantes homines et vincentes audacia, insuper et interemptae bestiae’ (the fourth day of consular games). 76 Cameron, Porphyrins, 228-30. 77 As usual, Cassiodorus’ flowery style is difficult to penetrate. I was greatly helped by the abbreviated translation in T. Hodgkin, The Letters o f Cassiodorus . . . (London, 1886). The consul concerned, Maximus, was a descendant of the man who spent 4,000 lb of gold on his son’s praetorian games.

The Buildings o f Secular Entertainment

115

feature, but in this case, unlike that of the gladiators, it is not necessary to invoke legislation as a reason for their eventual disappearance, since other possible and cogent reasons exist. Firstly, the venationes seem to have been mainly associated with consular games, which, of course, disappeared with the consulate in both East and West in the first half of the sixth century. Secondly, there was a powerful economic motive to let them drop, since they were an extremely waste­ ful form of conspicuous expenditure, ill suited to the troubled sixth century. Expensive beasts, even if less often speared in the arena, were not likely to survive captivity for long, whereas in chariot-racing there was at least a good chance that the horses would run again. Christianity perhaps provided a humane façade for abandoning them, but economics was what probably doomed them. This is, I think, very clear in the specifically Italian evidence. Chastagnol argued differently: that venationes, even in Rome, gradually became distasteful and rare, so that senators no longer carved their names on seats in the Colosseum after the late fifth century, and so that, when a consul in 523 wished to give them, he needed special royal permission, which Cassiodorus provided in Variae v. 42, though couched in terms of suitably sententious disapproval.78 However, this is by no means all the evidence we have concerning beast-shows in Ostrogothic Italy. The Anonymus Valesianus, in a sum­ mary of the reign of Theodoric, the king who was in theory so disapproving in 523, wrote that in Rome he offered ‘games in the circus and amphitheatre’, and that at Pavia he ‘built an amphitheatre’.79 At Pavia, Theodoric was in fact probably restoring, rather than building anew, and he may not have completed his repair, since a surviving inscription of the third year of the reign of Athalaric talks of the repair of ‘these seats of the entertainment building’, which may well refer to the amphitheatre.80 However, there is no reason to doubt the 78 Chastagnol, Sénat, 60-1. 79 Anon. Vales., c. 60 (p. 322) and c. 71 (p. 324). 80 Athalaric’s inscription: Panazza, no. 10 and tav. lxxiv = CIL v. 6418 = ILS 829 = Fiebiger-Schmidt, no. 203. The Anonymous Valesianus is apparently a Ravennate source, and is detailed about exactly how much Theodoric was restor­ ing, building, or even failing to complete projects, in Ravenna, but is much vaguer about Pavia and Verona, placing everything under the blanket term ‘fecit*.

116

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

basic facts of what the Anonymus wrote. Furthermore, Cassiodorus closed his brief Chronica in 519 with a short account of the magnificent ‘shows in the amphitheatre with different types of beast’,81 given in Rome by Theodoric’s son-in-law Eutharic to celebrate his consulate. There is no reason to believe that these brief statements of the Anonymus and Cassiodorus represent uses of beasts and the amphi­ theatre substantially different from and more humane than those condemned at length in Variae v. 42. All the evidence therefore suggests that Cassiodorus’ silence on the amphi­ theatre in all other letters than this one, and the inclusion of this letter in his collection, was the result of careful editing, and should not be taken as representative of the views of the Ostrogoths and their ministers on the amphitheatre. Rather, Variae v. 42 may only represent what the fallen minister felt these views should appear to have been. It seems instead that enthusiasm for the amphitheatre was very much alive in official circles in Ostrogothic Italy, and could well coexist with the humane condemnations of Variae v. 42, which did, after all, in the name of tradition allow the consul his request. None the less, it seems likely that these beast-shows were rare, as the epigraphic evidence of the Colosseum published by Chastagnol suggests. The explana­ tion for this is almost certainly the difficulty and cost of supplying beasts. In his account of the 519 games, Cassiodorus wrote of leasts which the present age would admire as a novelty’, and stated that even Africa had supplied some of the entertainments (i.e. animals): ‘Even Africa as a sign of devotion sent choice entertainments [voluptates exquisitas] for the show. ’ All this would have been quite normal in earlier imperial times, but, with Africa, the normal source of beasts, in Vandal hands and money less abundant, there was almost certainly a temptation to offer different entertainments. The abandonment in Italy of all forms of public entertain­ ment, except perhaps in Byzantine areas, oddly enough did not mean the total abandonment of all traditional uses of the entertainment buildings. As we shall see in Chapter 10, these 81 Cassiodorus, Chronica, a.519 (p. 161).

The Buildings o f Secular Entertainment

117

empty shells were also put to entirely new functions, but, alongside these, two older uses persisted, because, even in ruins, they remained the best places for display to a large crowd. For one of these uses, that of the circus as a backdrop for royal and imperial ceremonial, there is only one piece of evidence, that cited above for the elevation of Agilulf’s son Adaloald as co-ruler of the Lombard kingdom in the circus of Milan in 604. This was probably an exceptional event, since early medieval western kings perhaps normally involved huge crowds in their public displays of kingship only outside the towns in the presence of their armies. The other function is, however, slightly better attested: this was the use of the amphitheatre, theatre, or circus as a place of public punish­ ment. This was a normal practice in the late Empire and con­ tinued in the Byzantine East, where Guilland has collected the grim record of horrors performed publicly in Constantin­ ople’s circus and abandoned amphitheatre (the Cynegion).82 Three pieces of evidence show it also continued in Italy. Two relate to areas of Italy where Byzantine control and influence were strong. In 642/3 the exarch Isaac displayed the head of the rebel Maurice on a post in the circus of Ravenna, and in the pontificate of Stephen III (768-72) an unfortunate had his tongue and eyes ripped out in Rome’s Colosseum.83 For Lombard Italy there is no direct evidence, but in Verona in 905 a supporter of Louis of Provence was executed in the great amphitheatre of the town, which may perhaps have been continuously used for this purpose.84 Nor, indeed, did the disappearance of the great public games, paid for by patrons as a form of munificence, mean the end of all secular entertainments. It merely meant that entertainers came to rely on the patronage of courts for private display, and on the favours of the market-squares. This, of course, spelt the end of the great shows of conspicuous expenditure (the chariot-races, venationes, naumachia, etc.), 82 R. Guilland, ‘Etudes sur l’Hippodrome de Byzance, VI’, Byzantino slavica, 27 (1966), 302-6. 83 Lib. Pont. i. 332 and 472 (taking ‘Colosseo’ at this date to refer to the amphitheatre and not to the Colossus of Nero: Lib. Pont. i. 482 n. 23). 84 Gesta Berengarii, iv. 66-9: ‘Et miser in patria nudus truncaris harena.’ This could alternatively be the theatre of Verona, also referred to in tenth-century sources as arena.

118

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

but it did not destroy more humble entertainments—that of mimers, jesters, acrobats, strolling players, and such like. Scattered references, all in hostile sources, record the activities of these men and women all over western Europe throughout the early Middle Ages.85 For instance, in an extreme display of the virtues of Christian kingship, in 614/20 the pious Visigothic king of Spain Sisebut rebuked a bishop for his love of theatricals and of hunting, and in Carolingian times Alcuin found it necessary to warn a pupil travelling to Italy not to get involved with actors and mimers: ‘It is better to please God than actors, and better to care for the poor than for mimers.’86 This is a far cry from the rowdy circus of Ostrogothic times, but it does at least confirm that what had changed was the pattern of patronage, rather than the human desire to be entertained. 85 See the sources cited on p. 250 of Jürgens, op. cit. (p. 92 n. 1 above). One of the references cited from Gregory the Great and that cited from Pelagius are to theatre (and circus) images used by these popes. I do not think these necessarily refer to contemporary practices in Rome. For more information on players in the early Middle Ages: H. Reich, Der Mimus. Ein litterarentwicklungsgeschichtlicher Versuch (Beilin, 1903), 785-6. 86 Sisebut: M onumenta Germaniae Historica, Epistolae Merow et Karol Aevi, i. 668 no. 7: ‘Obiectum hoc: quod de ludis teatriis, faunorum scilicet ministerio sis ademptus, nulli videtur incertum.’ That a love of private players and hunting, not of the public theatre and venationes, is intended, is certain: Isidore of Seville’s account of how entertainment buildings functioned (Etymologiae, xvüi. 42-59) is in the past tense and refers to practices no longer to be seen in Spain. Alcuin: Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Epistolae, iv. 439 Ep. 281 (compare Gregory, Regulae Pastoralis, iii. 20, Migne, Patrologia Latina 77, p. 85B).

7

Water and Water-Supply The history of the provision of water and water-supply is a complex one, since it straddles three important, but very distinct, areas of patronage: the essentially luxurious munifi­ cence of classical times, the more austere charity of Christian­ ity, and the provision of basic urban amenities by the central government and its local representatives. With the patronage of the games, I have charted a relatively simple story of the decline of patronage of an amenity that was attacked by the Church and yet was not absolutely essential to secular govern­ ment, so eventually disappeared entirely. With water the story is different: as traditional secular munificence declined, a new Christian patronage took over and transformed part of what had gone before. To provide what is essential background to the problem, I shall start with a fairly long introductory section which sketches out the extent of classical water-patronage, and then examines its function as a necessity of town life, the attitude of classical patrons towards it, and, finally, the attitude of the Church. In a second section, I shall give an account of the decline of the secular water-patronage; in a third, some idea of the continuity and change brought about by the rise of a new and Christian tradition; in a fourth, set out the evidence for the continuity of private water-supply and bathing; and, finally, try and assess the limitations and scale of early medieval patronage.I I

In a comparatively brief period of time, the Romans brought about great changes in some of the practical details of daily life. In the towns, one of the most remarkable aspects of this achievement was the introduction of massive supplies of water,

120

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

by the building of the aqueducts and the construction of such amenities as large public baths and networks of sewers. The finest water-system of all was that of Rome itself, which in the course of about five centuries was endowed with eleven major aqueducts; yet even in the most remote provinces, wherever it was possible, towns were supplied with the luxury of piped water.1 Though the drinking-water supply, the baths, and the lavatories were mainly public, a second-century towndweller in the Roman Empire, and in particular in Italy, would perhaps have felt that these amenities were as standard and as necessary as a western European might consider them today. The full sophistication of Roman water-supply is only known for a few exceptional towns: those where large-scale excavation of a deserted site, such as Ostia or Pompeii, has revealed the aqueducts, the distribution-pipes, the private supply to the homes of the very rich, the public cisterns in the streets for everyone else, the baths, the lavatories, and the sewers; and the unique case of Rome, where Frontinus, curator aquarum under Nerva and Trajan, recorded in great detail his duties in a treatise, De Aquae D uctu* The evidence from other towns, and particularly those whose Roman re­ mains have been buried under medieval and modem structures, is inevitably far less complete, but is still more than sufficient to prove the very wide diffusion of complex water-systems.1234 The Romans were themselves justifiably proud of their hydraulic engineering. Pliny, describing the water-supply of Rome itself, spoke of ‘nothing more wonderful . . . in the whole world’. Frontinus and others felt they could compare this achievement favourably with the famous, beautiful, but useless public buildings of the Egyptians and Greeks: ‘Con­ sider so many massive and indispensable structures bringing 1 Rome: Ashby, 10-14 for a brief summary of these. 2 The text of Frontinus used here is in the Teubner series (it is also published in the Loeb series). A facsimile of the unique Monte Cassino manuscript appears in C. Herschel, The Two Books on the Water Supply o f the City o f Rom e o f Sextus Julius Frontinus, (Boston, 1899). Frontinus’ career is usefully discussed by A shby,26-33. 3 Evidence of baths in northern Italy: Mansuelli, 161-70. In Liguria: N. Lamboglia: Liguria romana (Alassio, 1939). 4 Pliny, Nat. Hist. xxxvi. 24.

Water and Water-Supply

121

in so much water, and compare them with the obviously idle pyramids or with the inert but famous buildings of the Greeks.’5 In Ostrogothic times, Cassiodorus wrote of the ‘splendid drains of Rome, that are so amazing to those who see them, that they excel the wonders of other cities’.6 In the early fourth century Rome had eleven large bath-buildings (thermae), 856 smaller ones {balnea), 1,352 public watercisterns, and 144 public lavatories.7 Ostia by the late fourth century had three large bath-buildings, twelve smaller ones, regularly spaced cisterns in the streets, and three public lavatories.8 The provincial town of Pompeii in ad 79, though only recently provided with an aqueduct (by Augustus), was similarly equipped, if on a smaller scale.9 To understand why all this classical sophistication decayed or was transformed to different functions, it is first of all necessary to dispel any idea that it constituted an unavoidable prerequisite of urban life. If it had done, it would certainly have decayed and altered far less than it did, and would belong in Part III of this book with indispensable amenities, such as city walls. Admittedly, extremely dense populations, of the kind familiar today and documented for Rome and Ostia in the first two centuries ad , did require a sophisticated watersupply to survive, but towns of this kind were highly excep­ tional even in the finest days of the Empire. Large populations could exist, even if at the expense of some comfort and hygiene, using water for drinking and washing drawn from wells, local springs, or from rain-water cisterns, and disposing of sewage directly into streams or into cesspits. It is highly significant that there is no evidence of the presence or absence of aqueducts greatly affecting settlement-pattern in Italy. The Hellenistic and Roman republican worlds had large towns, but only very elementary hydraulics, and it was not until the first century ad that aqueducts were introduced into 5 Frontinus, 16. See also Strabo, v. 3. 8, and Cassiodorus, Variae vii. 6. 6 Variae iii. 30. Pliny (see p. 120 n. 4 above) also particularly praised Rome’s drains. In the first half of the fifth century Polemius Silvius listed them as one of the seven wonders of the city: Cod. Top. R om . i. 310. 7 Lists from the Curiosum and Notitia Urbis R om ae: Cod. Top. R om . i. 153, 1 6 2 ,1 8 5 -6 , and 188. 8 Meiggs, 142-4 and 407-20. 9 Guida di Pompei, 2 6 ,4 9 ,1 3 0 ,1 3 4 ; H. Mygind, ‘Die Wassersorgung Pompejis’, Janus, 22 (1917), 294-351.

122

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

the towns of Italy.10 Yet by this date most of these had already reached a very respectable size. Pompeii, for instance, was a large town in 79, but had only recently been supplied with an aqueduct: the town before this had managed adequately, even for its public baths, on wells and rain-water cisterns.11 Because it is an essential point for understanding this whole chapter, I must be forgiven for what may seem like a long digression into the connection between water-supply and settlement. By the time the aqueducts were introduced, the Roman towns of Italy were firmly established, and in almost all cases had probably reached their greatest level of expan­ sion. A very basic fact, which must be understood, is that classical aqueducts very rarely moved water under pressure, and so were of the kind that could only supply towns in the plains or on low hills : in other words, towns without serious problems of finding alternative sources of water. The hilltop towns, which often did have these problems, were in very few cases reached by the Roman aqueducts.1213 In Procopius’ account of the Gothic Wars are two stories that illustrate well the fact that the aqueducts were not absolutely essential to urban life. In describing Belisarius’ siege of Naples, he recorded that: Belisarius cut the aqueduct which brought water into the city; but he did not in this way seriously disturb the Neapolitans, since there were wells inside the circuit-wall which sufficed for their needs and 1Ì kept them from feeling too keenly the loss of the aqueduct.

Similarly, from the account of Witigis’s siege of Rome, we leam that the cutting of the aqueducts was mainly felt by the Romans in the closing of the baths the populace of Rome were entirely unacquainted with the evils of war and siege. When, therefore, they began to be distressed by their inability to bathe and the scarcity of provisions . . . they began to be dissatisfied and indignant . . . 14 10 Rome, with its first aqueduct dating from 312 BC, is a notable exception. 11 See p. 121 n. 9 above. 12 An exception in Italy is Altari, whose water was raised 101m : CIL x. 5807 and pp. 567-70; J. B. Ward-Perkins, ‘The Aqueduct of Aspendos’, Papers o f the British S choolat R o m e, 23 (1955), 117. 13 Procopius, Gothic War, i. 8. 45 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 82-3). 14 Procopius, Gothic War, i. 20. 5 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 194-5).

Waterand Water-Supply

123

From a later passage of Procopius and from the account of this siege in the Liber Pontificalis, it is clear that for their water the Romans resorted to wells and springs inside the walls: ‘Inside the city there was such a shortage of provisions, that even water would have been sold if springs had not been used to help the supply.*15 Only in exceptional cases can the aqueducts be seen as much more than a refinement. One of these is the case of Ravenna, where a position in swampy land meant that the local water was of an appalling quality. Martial in the first century (before Trajan gave Ravenna an aqueduct) and Sidonius Apollinaris in the later fifth century (before Theodoric repaired this structure in 503) made jokes about the filthy quality of Ravenna’s water.16 Yet the town survived, and perhaps flourished in both periods. Despite undoubted problems with its water-supply, Ravenna’s importance in the early Empire, and particularly in the late Empire and early Middle Ages, was always assured by its port and its powerful defensive position set behind marshes.17 Indeed the theme of sacrificing ease of access, and with it very often facility of water-supply, in favour of security and strength is a feature of early medieval settlement in several areas of Italy, and can serve as a particularly eloquent example of the relatively minor role that an abundant water-supply played in determining settlement. During the Roman period the tendency, indeed the policy, was to settle the plains, abandoning to relative obscurity most of the powerful citadels of an earlier period. However, in late antiquity and the early Middle Ages many of the hilltop sites assumed again their old importance, though the exact chronology of this development is greatly disputed, and though there was undoubtedly con­ siderable regional variation. A dramatic example of this shift in settlement is the case of Orvieto, which is built on a massive ls- Procopius, Gothic War, i. 19. 28 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 192-3); ‘How­ ever, they had sufficient water to drink, since even for those who lived very far from the river it was possible to draw water from wells.’ Lib. Pont. i. 291. For springs in Rome: Lanciani, ‘Acque’, 8-28. 16 Martial, Epigr. ii. 56 and 57. Sidonius Apollinaris, Ep. i. v. 6 and Carmen ix, line 298 ‘undosae petiit sitim Ravennae’, For Theodoric see p. 129 n. 30 below. 17 On the defensive strength of Ravenna: Procopius, Gothic War, i. 1. 16-20 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 6-9).

124

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

outcrop of rock above the Tiber valley. After a period of decline in the Roman period, this Etruscan town again as­ sumed importance, because of its strong strategic position and despite a dependence on cisterns and on water carried up the hill (that is* until Antonio da Sângallo the Younger, in the early sixteenth century, carved the massive ‘Pozzo di San Patrizio’ through 63 m of rock). Most of these shifts in settlement to higher, safer, but drier, land were probably gradual, and almost all are remark­ ably badly documented; but there is one exceptional example of a planned resettlement that is fully described. Because of Saracen raiding, Pope Leo IV (847-55) decided to move the inhabitants of the port of Centumcellae (Civitavecchia) away from their exposed town on the coast to a new inland hilltop site, ‘Leopolis’. In the account of Leopolis’ foundation given in the Liber Pontificalis it is clear how this resettlement on higher land caused problems of water-supply, for the first site selected by Leo for his new town had no nearby water to supplement supply from rain-water cisterns or to drive the water-mills, and therefore had to be rejected: ‘But where the site seemed suitable to build the city, there was a shortage of water (which is always essential for human life).’18 The rejected site for Leopolis was obviously too extreme an example of sacrificing convenient sites on the plain with good water-supply, in favour of safer though drier positions ; but this was undoubtedly a phenomenon throughout the Italian peninsula. Procopius’ accounts of the sieges of Osimo and Urbino, in the Marche, bring out very clearly the advan­ tages and disadvantages of the newly favoured hilltop sites, for both these towns proved impregnable to the besieging Byzantines until shortage of water led to their surrender. At Osimo, Belisarius managed to poison a cistern fed by a spring just outside the walls so that the Goths ‘. . . made use of a well inside the fortifications which had an exceedingly scant supply of water, and thus supplied themselves during this 18 Lib. Pont. ii. 131. The account goes on to describe the strategic strength and abundant water of the site eventually chosen. For the remains of Leopolis today: O. Toti, La città medioevale di Centocelle, (Civitavecchia, 1958); D. Andrews, ‘Medieval Masonry in Northern'Lazio: its Development and Uses for Dating’, in H. McK. Blake et aLy eds . y Papers in Italian Archaeology I: the Lancaster Seminar (Oxford, 1978), 393 and pi. 26. ii.

Water and Water-Supply

125

time, but with a smaller quantity than they needed’.19 At Urbino there was only one spring . . . and from it all the inhabitants of the city were drawing water. This spring of its own accord little by little dried up and began to give out. And in these days the water had left it to such an extent that the barbarians drawing from it were drinking the water along with m ud .20

The effect of the decline of the aqueducts on the settle­ ment of Rome is well known, but this was by no means a typical case. Medieval Rome contracted into the low land on either side of the Tiber, abandoning settlement on the hills, and this may have been mainly because it was easier to obtain water in the lower land. But Rome was, for one obvious reason, highly exceptional: the massive Aurelianic walls surrounding the whole area of the classical city freed the inhabitants from the pressures of danger that elsewhere were to encourage settlement on the hills.21 It is not only essential to realize that aqueducts and watersystems in fact played little part in the establishment or survival of all but the densest settlement; it is also important to note that they were seen by contemporary patrons, too, more as a refinement (if an important one) than as a funda­ mental necessity. Although we have a mass of epigraphic evidence concerning the building and repair of both aqueducts and public baths, we find almost no evidence at all of an interest by patrons in providing for humbler, but perhaps more essential amenities, such as drinking-water cisterns, lavatories, or drains. The impression given by the overwhelming bias of the inscriptions, of both classical and late antique times, is very much that water was brought in by patrons to provide for the needs of large and splendid baths, not to provide drinking-water and flush drains.22 Classical patronage of water seems to have 19 Procopius, Gothic War, ii. 27. 1-24 (Loeb edition, voi. iv, pp. 100-9). 20 Procopius, Gothic War, ii. 19. 12-13 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 30-3). 21 Otherwise Rome might well have moved back to the hilltop archaic sites of settlement. In Rome, as elsewhere, a much more important factor in determining settlement than the aqueducts was the drainage of low land (as with the Cloaca Maxima), which allowed the city to expand into the plain and remain there to this day. 22 For examples of late antique secular water patronage see Chapter 2 above.

126

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

been more interested in civilized splendour than in mundane details of hygiene.23 Archaeology has shown that these humble details were also catered for in towns, perhaps largely by the town councils themselves. But lavatories that flushed and public watercisterns fed by piped water depended not only on a prosper­ ous council, but also directly on the desire to bring in piped water, which came in the first place mainly for the baths: it is very doubtful if the aqueducts, essential for these functions, would have been built if the baths had not existed. Indeed, we find that public lavatories were often annexed to bathbuildings and flushed with their waste water.24 This was not only a sensible use of resources; it is also a clear indication of priorities. Equally, although Romans were fully aware of the hygienic importance of bathing, this was only one motive behind the bath-buildings. Hygiene, after all, could be catered for in a much more modest manner, even by washing in a tub at home; but the great quantities of water and the huge bathbuildings were needed to make hygiene pleasant and luxurious, and to provide suitable displays of munificence. We find this emphasis on the magnificent and the luxurious side to waterpatronage even in an Ostrogothic account of Theodoric’s repair of the aqueduct of Ravenna, where, as we have seen, drinking-water was in fact an unusually serious problem. This account, in Variae v. 38, seems to treat the improvement in the drinking-water supply almost as an afterthought to the more sensuous advantages of piped water: Then there will be a splendid display in the baths and the pools will fill with clear glassy water; then we shall have water that cleans, not dirties, and afterwards it will not be necessary to rewash at once. Let us also add that, if we have good drinking-water, all our food will be improved, since to man no food is pleasant when the water is not clear and sweet. For, if we wish the cleanest water to bathe in, are we not even more eager to have such water to drink?

The attitude of the Church to water, in particular to the baths, was very different. In the East, in some circles, there even flourished an ascetic idea that water was only for drinking 23 Compare Hands, 60-1 and 90-2. 24 Pompeii: Guida di Pompei, 134. Ostia: Meiggs, 143.

Wa ter and Wa ter-Supply

127

and basic washing, and that all forms of bathing were morally wrong. In the West, a less extreme line was normally taken: bathing for the sake of cleanliness and hygiene was not only allowed, but even encouraged, especially for ritual reasons before great feasts of the Church. However, all moral abuses, such as mixed bathing (balnea mixta), and indeed any idea of deriving pleasure in washing, were to be stamped out.25 As Gregory the Great wrote, the bath was ‘for the needs of the body’, not ‘for the titillation of the mind [luxu animi] and for sensuous pleasure.’26 Unlike the temples and the games, the Church was inter­ ested in water and prepared to adapt it to its own ends; but, as we shall see, both the spirit of the new Christian patronage and its scope were very different from those of the pleasures of classical bathing. II

Scattered through Chapters 2 and 3 I have already set out the evidence for the survival and eventual end of the patronage of traditional secular baths and the aqueducts to feed them. I shall therefore restrict myself here to a brief summary, con­ centrating on the very end of the story. Private patronage of aqueducts and baths by aristocrats (mainly patroni) and public patronage by governors can be documented until the early fifth century, above all in the provinces south of Rome (see pp. 20 and 2 4 -6 ).27 Even a glance at the evidence set out in Chapters 2 and 3 makes one 25 Here I am closely following the excellent study by Zellinger. See also: H. Dumaine, ‘Bains’, in F. Cabrol, e d Dictionnaire d ’archéologie chrétienne et de liturgie, ii, cols. 72-117. I am grateful to Peregrine Horden for advice and refer­ ences on this subject. Eastern asceticism: Zellinger, 47-67. Western attitude: ibid. 1-33. Attack on abuses and pleasure: ibid. 34-6 and 91-2. 26 Gregory, Ep. xiii. 3. 27 To the evidence set out in Chapter 2 should be added that of a repair in 407 by the citizens of Abella in Campania to an aqueduct serving Abella, Nola, and St. Paulinus* nearby shrine to St. Felix. This is commemorated in Paulinus, Carmen xxi, lines 650-858. For my purposes the poem has severe drawbacks: it is keen to attribute the work to the influence of St. Felix and does not tell us precisely which of the citizens of Abella were involved (was this a very late civic repair, or was it a repair paid for by a patronus?) 9and it is also not clear precisely what the motives for the repair were (was it done mainly for their own town, supplying Paulinus’ shrine only incidentally ; or vice versa?).

128

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

thing very clear: the baths were in late antiquity much the most popular area of what remained of secular public building (excepting city walls, and, perhaps, palaces). They were re­ paired long after buildings like basilicas and curiae disappear from the record. However, such popularity- could not save them for ever. They depended, like everything else, on a constantly decreas­ ing desire by patrons to build and maintain, or on shrinking public funds. Aristocratic patronage and that of governors, even in the limited areas where it had existed in the fourth century, ceased altogether in the early fifth. In a previous chapter (2) I have already explored in detail the various reasons for this ; here I should merely like to stress again the limited direct role of Christianity as a destructive force of secular patronage. Although the games were far more often decried by the Church than the baths, private patronage of the latter none the less disappeared sooner than that of the former (which can be documented until Ostrogothic times in Rome).28 This was undoubtedly because the appeal of political display was for many patrons of more importance than the strictures of religion. Consequently, the games, which were closely tied up with the traditional panoply of senatorial and consular prestige, continued to find private patrons throughout the fifth century, despite ecclesiastical strictures, whereas the less harmful baths came to depend entirely on imperial or royal patronage. Such direct patronage by the central government survived in a very few privileged towns. Under the Ostrogoths, the aqueducts were restored at Ravenna, Verona, and Parma, baths were built (or repaired) at Pavia and Verona, and free bathing provided to the citizens of Spoleto (see p. 30). In Rome the traditional secular organization to run the aque­ ducts and water-supply was maintained and funded.29 Possibly this achievement, limited though it was (only Parma and Spoleto were not royal capitals), in fact represented a con­ siderable improvement on the previous situation: all sources are agreed that Theodoric’s restoration of Ravenna’s aqueduct in 502/3 came after a long period of disrepair, and this 28 See Chapter 6 above. 29 Variae vii. 6, the Formula Comitivae Formarum.

Water and Water-Supply

129

is supported by Sidonius Apollinaris’ account in 467 of Ravenna’s appalling water and lack of an aqueduct: . . though surrounded by water, we went thirsty, for nowhere was there a clean aqueduct, a clear cistern, a decent spring, or a pure well’.30 From this evidence it seems that before Ostrogothic times even Ravenna, the imperial capital up to 476 and then the royal capital of Odoacre, was for the whole of the later fifth century without piped water. After Ostrogothic times, the evidence for secular concern for water-patronage gradually disappears. In Lombard Italy there is no good evidence of patronage of a classical-style secular water-supply. In Historia Langobardorum v. 37 Paul the Deacon tells a story, set in late seventh-century Pavia, of King Cunicpert’s wife seeing a noble girl, Theodota, in the bath, reporting her beauty to the King, and thereby unwit­ tingly exciting his lust. This story can be taken to refer to a secular public bath of Roman type.31 But there are two problems to this interpretation: firstly, this bath is anyway most easily seen as a private palace-bath open also to nobles, like Charlemagne’s at Aachen (queens, after all, are unlikely ever to have frequented fully public baths), and, secondly, the information contained in the story is suspect since it closely echoes one told of Valentinian I and his wife Justina, as recorded by the historian Socrates.32 On these two counts, I think it is safest to disregard the story of Theodota as evidence of public baths. In Lombard Milan in c.739 the poem in praise of the city contains the line *it takes water through a channel to the baths’.33 This reference to aqueduct and baths functioning in c.739 is not, however, precise or detailed enough to make it certain that traditional secular public baths are being described. 30 Sidonus Apollinaris, Ep. i. v. 6 (unless, as seems implausible, he is referring to a functioning, but poor aqueduct). Theodoric’s repair: Cassiodorus, Chronica, 160 a.502-3: ‘formam . . . instauravit, quae longis ante fuerat ad solum reducta temporibus’; Fiebiger, Zweite Folge, no. 7: ‘D. N. Theodericus/civitati reddidit’ (on lead pipes discovered at Ravenna); Anon. Vales. 324: ‘Hie aquae ductum Ravennae restauravit, quem princeps Traianus fecerat, et post multa tempora aquam introduxit.’ The Anon. Vales, also says of the Verona aqueduct ‘quod per multa tempora destructum fuerat” 31 Bullough, ‘Pavia’, 97. 32 Socrates, Historia Ecclesiastica, iv. 31 (ed. R. Hussey, 3 vols. (Oxford, 1853)). I am grateful to Roger Tomlin for this reference. 33 Versus, 146 line 18.

130

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

In view of the evidence set out below, in Section III of this chapter, I think it is safest to assume that the poet is writing of an aqueduct and baths maintained and run for ecclesiastical purposes, which, as we shall see, was a very different matter. Disregarding, as I think we must, the evidence of Theodota and the Milan Versus, we are left with no firm indication of the Lombards indulging in the secular patronage of water in Roman or Ostrogothic style. This silence, which embraces both literary and epigraphic sources, fits very well with the silence we have encountered over Lombard patronage of the games, another area of traditional secular patronage once thought of as an essential part of the display of civilized rule. In Byzantine Italy the position was slightly different. Rome’s building-organization, including its aqueduct-fund, survived the Gothic War, at least in theory, and was described in the Pragmatic Sanction of 554.34 It has even been argued that Belisarius undertook a major repair of the city’s aque­ ducts.35 I am very sceptical of this idea, since it is based on three doubtful assumptions. Firstly, it is argued that some major repair work in opus mixtum masonry, still visible on the remains of the Marcia, Claudia, and Alexandrina aque­ ducts, is Belisarian, because it is very similar to masonry that may be the work of Belisarius in the city walls of Rome. However, even if the wall-work is Belisarian, masonry styles never changed fast enough for us to attribute with confidence the aqueduct-repairs to the same builder; and there is, for instance, no reason at all why this opus m ixtum should not be slightly earlier and of Ostrogothic times. Secondly, it is assumed that these repairs must be Belisarian, because he must have repaired damage done to the aqueducts by Witigis, who cut off Rome’s water-supply during his siege of the city. However, there is no evidence that Witigis did anything other than pierce the channels of Rome’s aqueducts in one place each, in order to stop the flow of water, and there is every reason to suppose that he would have avoided seriously damaging the facilities of a city he intended to occupy. Thirdly, a fragmentary inscription, ‘b e l i s a r i u s . ADQVISIVIT . . . a n n o . . .’, built into part of the Aqua Traiana, can be taken 34 See p. 47 n. 42 above. 35 Ashby, 15-16 and 236; Van Deman, 2 0 -1 ,2 6 6 , 329-30.

Water and Water-Supply

131

to refer to repairs.36 This is not at all clear from the words that survive, and it is also not wholly certain whether the inscription belongs in origin to the Aqua Traiana, since it could even have been brought here from elsewhere as building material for later papal repairs. On balance, while accepting that several aqueducts were repaired on a major scale in late opus m ixtum masonry (perhaps of the sixth century), I do not consider the evidence is sufficient to attribute this work to Belisarius, or indeed to post-Ostrogothic times. If we ignore, as I think we must, the ‘Belisarian’ repairs, there is no evidence of major repairs or even of satisfactory upkeep of Rome’s aqueducts by secular government after the fall of the Ostrogoths. No inscriptions survive recording repairs, and the comes formarum disappears entirely from the record after a final reference to him in a letter of Gregory the Great of 602. This letter perhaps implies that this official had not been appointed for some time, and certainly makes it clear that the aqueducts were in a pitiful state: ‘for the aque­ ducts are so looked down on and so neglected that, unless a greater effort is made, they will soon fall into complete dis­ repair’.37 In Gregory’s time, although in a bad state, some semblance of secular organization clearly did survive, and in his pontificate we also have the last reference I know of to a functioning secular public bath in Rome; but after Gregory there is silence until we find the popes repairing the aque­ ducts for very different purposes from those of classical munificence.38 From another letter of Gregory we also learn that in 598 the aqueduct of Naples was still working. However, it had already, at least temporarily, slipped out of secular hands, since Gregory’s letter is to the bishop of Naples, ordering him to give back control of the gates of the city to Theodore and of the aqueduct to Rusticus, who were both laymen and were probably the secular officials who should have been in 3‘ CIL xi. 3298; Lanciani, ‘Aeque’, 166. 37 Gregory, Ep. xii. 6. The letter refers to an official in charge of the aque­ ducts, without specifically naming him as the comes formarum. 38 Bath: Gregory, Homiliae in Evangelia, I. vi. 6 (= Migne, Patrologia Latina, 76, col. 1098). From the context, Gregory definitely seems to be referring to a secular public bath: ‘Si quis vestrum, fratres, ad forum aut fortasse ad balneum pergit, quem otiosum esse considerat ut secum veniat invitat.’

132

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

command of these facilities: ‘So, Brother, we ask you, as soon as you receive this letter, to restore without further ado the gates of the city into the hands of Theodore vir magnificus and maior populi, and the aqueduct to Rusticus vir clarissimus and senior.,39 In Ravenna, the capital o f the Byzantine mainland, the secular public water-supply probably lasted longest. In c.600 the emperor Maurice Tiberius restored the aqueduct of the city during the governorship of Smaragdus.3940 There is a refer­ ence to public baths functioning in around 700 included in Agnellus’ history (of the first half of the ninth century); but there are unfortunately problems in accepting the informa­ tion contained in this passage, which I have discussed on p. 109. Outside Rome, Naples, and Ravenna, all major towns, there is, to the best of my knowledge, no evidence at all. While secular government certainly eventually lost all interest in splendid displays of traditional patronage through baths and aqueducts, it did not, however, altogether lose interest in water, for the obvious reason that this was not only a source of pleasure and luxury, but, at a basic level, a necessity. Consequently, when all more lavish secular patron­ age had been stripped away, we find secular government still concerned, though on a humble scale, with the provision of two amenities: water for domestic use, and functioning drains. The law-codes of both Rothari and Liutprand contain clauses concerning well-water; these are not specifically aimed at townsmen, but were, after the disappearance of piped water and public cisterns, as relevant to them as to anyone else. Both clauses are intended to remove all responsibility from the owners for accidents happening at privately owned wells, the intention being to ensure that wells, though private, should be kept open to the use of all (including the poor and strangers): The owner of the well should not be held responsible, since, if he is blamed, he will then forbid anyone to draw water from his well; and, since not everyone can own a well, the poor, who do not, will die, and even travellers will suffer hardship. (Liutprand)41 39 Gregory, Ep. ix. 76. For the background to this dispute: J. Richards, Consul o f God (London, 1980), 165-8. 40 CIL xi. 11 = ILS 836. 41 Rothari, cl. 306 and Liutprand, cl. 136 (= M onumenta Germaniae Historica, Leges, iv. 71 and 166-7).

Water and Water-Supply

133

A well, as we learn from the early eighth-century Memoratorium de Mercedibus Commacinorum, was an expensive com­ modity: ‘VIII. On Wells. If he builds a well 100 feet deep, he should be paid 20 solidi', but receive no food. A well of 30 feet, 3 solidi-, a well of 12 feet, 1 solidus, and again no food.’42 The charters of Lucca and elsewhere show that ownership or partownership of a well was of considerable importance; but many must have relied on others’ water-supply.43 Such government intervention was very limited indeed, since it was only an attempt to keep private water-supply open to public use, but it does illustrate what I shall be stressing in Part III of this book: when descending to the bare necessities of urban life, secular government in Lombard Italy rarely abandoned its responsibilities. The same is true of drains: we no longer find evidence of complex systems of flushing them with spare water from the aqueducts {caducae), such as Frontinus documents in Rome, but we do find a concern to keep at least some of them un­ blocked and functioning.44 This may have been more to prevent flooding from rain- and spring-water than to carry away sewage, since open spaces in early medieval towns may have been large enough to dispose of the latter into cesspits (only archaeology will show whether this is true, but the Lucca charters certainly suggest that houses were normally surrounded by a fairly spacious area and often had gardens).45 A capitulary of Charlemagne or Louis the Pious laid down that it was the duty of each town of the Italian kingdom to carry out a yearly clearance and maintenance of its streets and of its drains, under the supervision of the local governor.46 The capitulary does not specifically state this fact, but it is probable that this was an ancient duty, inherited perhaps (like those of wall-, bridge-, palace-, and church-work: see Chapters 8 and 9 below) through the Lombards from late Roman times. Under the Ostrogoths we find a similar duty being enjoined on the citizens of Parma, ordered to clear the drains of their town (above and below ground) by Athalaric.47 42 M onumenta Germaniae Historica, Leges, iv. 180. 43 Wells: e.g. Schiaparelli, CDL> nos 30 and 65. 44 Frontinus, 111. 45 Belli Barsali, 4 8 8 -9 . 46 Capit. i. 216 no. 3. 47 Variae viii. 29 and 30.

134

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

Interestingly enough, there is evidence that in at least one town such basic maintenance was successful. In the tenth century, the historian Liutprand of Cremona twice referred to his native Pavia’s drains {cloacae): both are highly poetic references (to them being choked with corpses in 894, and running with molten gold in 924).44*48 However, the first reference, which speaks of the Vaults of the city, in other words the drains’, is also precise. The Roman drains of Pavia are clear and functioning today and are also known to have been so in the fourteenth century when described by Opicino de Canistris : When it rains, both the roads of the whole city and the latrine-chutes which each house has are flushed out through deep underground drains. These vaulted drains are like beautiful buildings under the earth, and some have vaults or arches that are so high that a horse and rider can pass through them .49

In view of these facts and Liutprand’s references, I see no reason to doubt that Pavia’s drains have ever been allowed to block or fall into disrepair. Pavia’s drains are also interesting (and exceptional) because they have been the subject of a recent comprehensive study.50 This has shown how they serve to carry off not only the rain-water and the sewage introduced into them by man (as mentioned by Opicino), but also a constant flow of ground-water. This fact helps explain both why it was essential to maintain the drains of Pavia, and how they could also function effectively as sewers. Because they carry off ground-water, they are vital to the town to prevent flooding; and for precisely the same reason, they make very efficient self-flushing sewers (helped occasionally by rain), which do not need an artificial inflow of piped water from an aqueduct. I do not know how typical of the drains of Italy are those of Pavia, but their example does suggest caution before dis­ missing all early medieval town life as wholly unsophisticated. The Pavesi admittedly inherited their drains from antiquity, 44 Liutprand, Antapodosis, i. 35 and iii. 3 line 20. 49 Anonymus ticinensis (= Opicino de Canistris), Liber de laudibus civitatis ticinensis,ed. R.Maiocchi and F. Quintavalle (Città di Castello, 1903) (= Muratori, Rerum Italicarum Scriptores, nuova edizione, X I.l), 20. 50 C. Tomaselli, U sistema di fognature romane di Pavia (Pavia, 1978).

Water and Water-Supply

135

but they did maintain them. If (as seems probable) the fourteenth-century evidence of Opicino is valid for the whole Middle Ages, they used them not only for the disposal of ground- and rain-water, but also for the disposal of sewage. in

In the very period that patronage of the secular public baths and aqueducts was disappearing, there appears in Italy con­ siderable evidence of water and water-supply being supported by the new Christian patrons for motives of charity, hygiene, and ritual. Most of our evidence concerns patronage of baths and bathing, and this can conveniently be divided into two categories, with some overlap between them: baths for the bishops and the clergy, and baths for the poor. Baths for the clergy are interesting because they not only represent a degree of continuity from classical times, but also accentuate the difference between the classical and the Christian traditions. Many of the clerical baths which functioned in late antique and early medieval Italy were established not to replace the old secular baths, after these had ceased to function, but while they were still working, as rival establishments. This was certainly because the secular baths were not considered morally salubrious. In Ravenna both the orthodox and the Arian clergies are recorded to have had baths of this kind.51 That of the orthodox, adjoining the episcopal palace, was rebuilt by Bishop Victor (537-45), who decorated it with marble veneer and mosaics. In an inscription he recorded his demo­ lition of the older bath and building of the new, larger, and more splendid structure (‘that it might rise larger . . . and more beautiful’), and also his decree that the clergy of the city should bathe in it free of charge twice a week, on Tues­ days and Fridays: ‘He laid down a custom forali future times, so that the clergy of the city could twice a week wash free of charge, being granted this right on Tuesdays and Fridays.’52 The rest of the week, use of the bath may have been restricted to the bishop alone, or to the bishop and the cathedral clergy. 51 Arian bath: Agnellus, RR.II.SS. 217.

51 Ibid. 183.

136

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

This clerical bath, though built when Ravenna’s secular baths still functioned, outlasted them and was still being used in the ninth century, when described by Agnellus: ‘still today it functions splendidly [usque hodie mirifice lavat] .’ In Naples in the mid fifth century a bath was built by Bishop Nostrianus, which was also still standing and still named after him (and presumably working) in the ninth century.53 Although our source for this is not precise as to its function, this bath too was almost certainly a clerical one. Outside Rome there is no evidence of bishops having bath­ houses separate from those of their clergy, and good evidence from Ravenna that they shared them; it is therefore probable thatthelate seventh-century steam baths {(t)hermaru(m)q(ue) vapores), built by Bishop Damian of Pavia and referred to in the same line of inscription as his work to the episcopal palace, were intended to serve both the bishop and his clergy.54 Similarly, when in 873 the bishop of Verona was granted permission to take a water-pipe over the bridge of the city to his palace, he too may well have been improving this kind of bath.55 Monastic communities with their own baths are also recorded, though, if monastic rules are any indication of practice, these were used only infrequently, above all for the sick and before the great feasts of the church year.56 In 774 Duke Arechis II of Benevento granted to the monastery of S. Sofia a water-pipe to feed its bath, and a yearly supply of cart-loads of wood for its heating.57 A group of four charters of 761 from Brescia concerns the water-supply of King Desiderius’ foundation of S. Salvatore, almost certainly for its bath.58 These charters are agreements with owners of private land inside Brescia, allowing the monastery of S. Salvatore (in exchange for payment) to run its aqueduct under their land, with the right of access in case of the need to 53 Gesta Ep. Neap. 406. 54 Panazza, no. 61. 35 Cod. Dip. V er.,i. no. 242. 56 Zellinger, 68-83. Rule o f St. Benedict, chapter 36. 57 F. Ughelli and N. Coletti, Italia Sacra, 2nd edn., voi. viii, col. 32. This docu­ ment does not prove, as Mengozzi (pp. 144-5) would have it, that there were secular public baths suported by the fisc in eighth-century Benevento. s® Schiaparelli, CDL, nos. 151, 152, and 153 of 761;no. 158 probably of the same date.

Water and Water-Supply

137

repair. Although it cannot be proved, this monastic aqueduct may well have been largely a refurbishment of the old Roman structure given to the colony by the emperor Tiberius.59 In Rome it is impossible to sort out from all the vague references to late antique and early medieval Christian baths, which refer to which precise function: indeed, it is possible that many of them were used as occasion demanded, either for the clergy or the poor and needy. Baths of an ill-defined type, but attached to churches, were built by Pope Symmachus (498-514) at S. Paolo fuori-le-mura (where he also established a home for the poor), S. Michele, and S. Pancrazio; those of S. Paolo, according to an inscription, were repaired later in the sixth or in the early seventh century.60 At S. Lorenzo fuori-le-mura Pope Hilarus (461-8) built a monastery with two baths, one of them open-air: ‘he built a monastery at S. Lorenzo with a bath, and another one in the open air [sub aere]’; lead pipes found near S. Lorenzo stamped ‘+ s a l v o PAPA IOHANNE / ST(E)FANVS P(RAE)P(OSITVS) REPARAVIT’ refer to a restoration of this water-supply, almost certainly during the pontificate of John I (523-6) or John II (533-5) (since a Stefanus is recorded as praepositus of S. Lorenzo in an inscription of 526).61 Two centuries later Pope Gregory II (715-31) again restored S. Lorenzo’s water: ‘after a long interruption he brought water through jointed pipes back to that church’.62 Two entries in the Einsiedeln Itinerary, of the late eighth or early ninth century, perhaps refer to two more ecclesiastical baths: ‘S. Silvestro; there a bath [ibi balneum] ’, and ‘S. Susanna and water from the Lateran aqueduct [et aqua de forma Lateranense]'.63 However, the connection between this balneum and this aqua and the two churches is not explicit, and they could in fact be unconnected: for instance, an abandoned classical bath (of a kind recorded elsewhere by the Itinerary) might have stood near S. Silvestro, and an aqueduct may have passed (without stopping) near S. Susanna. Baths intended for both the poor and the clergy are referred 59 Storia di Brescia, i. 273-5. CIL v. 4307 = IL S 114. 60 Lib. Pont. i. 262-3. Repairs: G. B. De Rossi, La Roma sotterranea cristiana, iii (Rome, 1877), 463-4. “ Lib. Pont. i. 245 and 247 n. 10. 63 Ibid. 3 97 . 63 Cod. Top. Rom. ii. 182.

138

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

to in Rome in the pontificate of Hadrian I (772-95), when the purpose of restoring the Aqua Traiana aqueduct bringing water to the area of St. Peter’s was described as being for the baptistery, atrium, and ‘the bath, to the benefit of pilgrims and the clergy serving there’.64 From this reference it seems possible (unless the benefit to both pilgrims and clergy refers to the whole complex of water-facilities, rather than to the bath specifically) that a single bath near St. Peter’s served both the clergy of the basilica and the pilgrim visitors. Hadrian’s successor, Leo III (795-816), is recorded to have built two baths by the basilica, one to the north of the church, which is described as a charity-bath (‘a marvellously decorated bath built from the foundations for the succour of Christ’s poor and of pilgrims’), and another to the south, whose purpose is unspecified (‘a bath . . . built in a round form’).65 Though it is not stated, this latter circular bath may have been intended for the popes and for the clergy of St. Peter’s, who in the previous pontificate had apparently had to share the pilgrims’ bath-house. An anecdote told in 884/7 by Notker the Stammerer shows that all these Italian clerical baths were not without effect. Notker tells a story of an Italian deacon who came to a sticky end, and, in describing the man, includes an account of his unnatural cleanliness, which he sees as typical of am Italian: There was a deacon, used to resisting nature, as Italians tend to [ iu x ta C is a lp in o r u m c o n tr a n a tu r a m p u g n a r e s o l i t u s ] , who would go to the baths, be shaved very closely, polish his skin, manicure his nails, cut his hair so short that his head looked as if it had been f%fk turned on a lathe, and wear linen and a spotlessly white shirt. c o n s u e tu d in e m

The new Christian patronage catered not only for the clergy itself, but also for the needy and sick. The bath for this purpose near St. Peter’s is particularly well documented. In the area between the basilica and the river, Pope Hadrian I (772-95) restored two charitable diaconiae, and laid down that the duties of their clergy were to include a weekly pro­ cession on Thursday ‘ad balneum’ (probably the bath near 64 See Appendix 3.A. 65 Lib. Pont. ii. 27-8. “ Monachus Sangallensis (Notkerus Balbulus), De Carolo Magno, ed. G. Meyer von Knonau, (St. Gallen, 1920) (= Mitteilungen zur vaterländischen Geschichte, xxxvi), 29 c. xxxii.

Water and Water-Supply

139

St. Peter’s), where they would minister and give alms to the poor. The choice of Thursday for this must certainly have been in imitation of Christ’s washing of the disciples on Maundy Thursday.67 As we have seen above, this bath (if it is the same one) is referred to again under Hadrian as serving the needs of the pilgrims to St. Peter’s, and earlier in the same pontificate it is mentioned a third time, when the Pope’s repair of the Aqua Traiana is described; this time the needs of the poor at Easter are specifically mentioned: ‘the bath . . . where our brothers, Christ’s poor, usually bathe when they come yearly to receive alms at Easter . . .’. The needs of this bath, here described to be for the infirm and pilgrims, are later stated as the main reason for the repair of St. Peter’s water-supply by Nicholas I (858-67).68 Baths of this charitable type perhaps existed all over Rome: at least some of the ill-defined church-baths cited above could well have served for such ends on occasion. When Hadrian I (772-95) restored the Claudia aqueduct, the Liber Pontificalis recorded of its waters that ‘its waters flowed to several churches on the holy day of Easter.’69 This may possibly refer to a practice of all parishioners bathing in churches before the great Easter solemnities. However, this is unparalleled elsewhere in Italy, and it seems most likely, in view of the evidence that the poor were ministered to in baths at Easter both at St. Peter’s and also in Naples and Lucca (see below), that these same charitable ends, directed specifically at the poor, are here being referred to.70 The evidence for Naples is from the ninth-century Gesta Episcoporum and refers to a charitable diaconia set up by Bishop Agnellus in the second half of the seventh century. This diaconia was largely concerned with the distribution of food, but the bishop also ‘ordered that soap for washing should be given twice each year, at Christmas and at Easter. This, with the Lord’s favour, is still done today.’71 A similar 67 Lib. Pont. i. 506. 68 For Hadrian and Nicholas, see Appendix 3.A. 69 See Appendix 3 .A. 70 For a Frankish bishop spending all Faster Saturday washing the poor, and for a clear statement of the ritual and spiritual gains to both benefactor and benefitted: Notker, op. cit. (p. 138 n. 66 above), 19 c. xxi. 71 Gesta Ep. Neap. 418.

140

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

grant of soap for the poor, though in this case not specifically connected with religious feasts, is referred to in Lombard Italy. In 744 one of the actions of King Hildeprand’s brief reign was to confirm a grant of King Liutprand to the church of Piacenza of the thirty pounds of soap owed to the Lombard palace by that city, which ‘was granted by our uncle [i.e. Liutprand] for washing the poor’.72 Charitable baths and their particular connection with Easter Week also appear in Lombard and Carolingian Lucca. In 720 a xenodochium granted to the church of S. Silvestro had a bath attached, and in 790 another xenodochium with a bath had the specific duty ‘that always in Easter week the priest of that xeno­ dochium shall have the bath heated, so that the poor can be washed there all week’.73 Before passing on to other matters, some obvious general points about ecclesiastical public baths need to be made. Firstly, it is quite clear from the evidence that the sections of the population catered for by these baths were strictly limited—the clergy itself and those poor enough to need charity. The large area of society in between was apparently not catered for at all. This represents a radical change from classical public baths, which were intended for the enjoyment and cleanliness of the whole town, with the probable excep­ tion only of the very poor (since a token entrance-fee of a quadrans was normally demanded, unless waived by a munifi­ cent gift).74 There is obvious continuity in some respects between the baths of classical times and those of the early middle Ages (even the gifts of free soap echo the gifts of oil for washing of the classical period).75 However, there is also a great difference in the nature of the recipients of such patronage, because this had moved away from munificence, designed to benefit fellow citizens, towards charity, designed to succour Christ’s poor. It is also clear that these baths were not meant to be enjoy­ able. They may well in fact have been so, at least for the 72 L. M. Hartmann, Zur Wirtschaftgeschichte Italiens im frühen Mittelalter (Gotha, 1904), 126 and 128. 73 720: Schiaparelli, CDL, no. 24.790: Bars, no. 231. 74 Gifts of free bathing: e.g. CIL v. 376, ix. 5074, xi. 720 and 6167, xiv. 3015. 75 Gifts of oil: e.g. CIL v.’ 5279, xi. 3811, 5717, 6033, and 6360. For an imperial grant: Suetonius,Nero, 12.

Water and Water-Supply

141

clergy. From the descriptions of several of them it is clear that they were heated (Pavia’s clerical bath, and that of S. Sofia of Benevento) and decorated (the orthodox bath at Ravenna, and both Leo Ill’s baths at St. Peter’s). But pleasur­ able bathing, not surprisingly, is no longer mentioned as the intention, and classical phrases to describe baths, such as ‘the delight of the people’ {gaudia populorum ), are cast aside.76 Instead we find Nicholas I’s repair of the water-supply for the charitable bath at St. Peter’s compared to Christ’s descent from heaven to minister to the poor (see Appendix 3.A), and we also find a strong ritual element running through much of the evidence. Although a careful distinction was drawn between physical and spiritual cleanliness, the Church en­ couraged washing of the body before purging the soul on Sundays, and, above all, before Easter. Easter week and, at St. Peter’s at least, all Thursdays were also popular periods for washing the poor, an activity intended not only to benefit them, but also to benefit the souls of the washers. A similar ritual concern was the main motive for another area of Christian patronage of water, that of fountains set in the atria before churches.77 From two letters of Paulinus of Noia, it is clear that these were intended for the washing of the hands before entering church.78 An inscription set up by Leo I (440-61) over his fountain in the atrium of S. Paolo fuori-le-mura also asked the faithful to wash their hands before entering the sanctuary, but made it clear that they should not confuse cleanliness of body with purity of soul: Water removes dirt from the body; but faith, purer than any spring, cleanses sins and washes souls. You, who enter as a suppliant at the shrine of St. Paul, made holy by his merits, wash your hands in the fountain .79

Paulinus at his sanctuary of St. Felix near Noia, built in the years around 400, set up marble basins for this ritual purpose in front of the shrine, despite great problems in 76 Used, for example, in Variae ü. 37. 77 Zellinger, 104-9; Dictionnaire d*archêologie chrétienne et de liturgie, ‘Canthare’; Reallexicon fü r A ntike und Christentum, ‘Cantharus’. 78 Paulinus, Ep. xxxii. 15 about Nola; Ep. xiii. 13 about St. Peter’s (here referring also to washing the face). 79 De Rossi, Inscr. Christ. ii. 80-1 no. 13 = IL C V 1514.

142

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

ensuring an adequate water-supply to feed them. A poem, datable to 403, describes how he originally depended on an inadequate trickle of water from an aqueduct leading out of Noia, but then set up large rain-water cisterns to meet the difficulty. Yet this solution too was clearly unsatisfactory, since he mentions that the fountain-basins are beautiful even when dry.80 Finally in 407 the citizens of Abella solved the problem, by repairing an aqueduct which brought water not only to their own town, but also to Noia and St. Felix’s shrine : the aqueduct led from distant hills and had previously been blocked through years of decay. It would collect water from a number o f different springs in the mountains and bring it back to the towns that had lacked it. With its channel full for the many miles of its course, it would also supply the shrine o f our Felix and fill the new pipe with its abundant flow, (lines 744 - 50)81

In Rome, besides Leo’s fountain at S. Paolo, we have a description of an elaborate fountain set up by Pope Hilarus (461-8) in front of the Lateran baptistery, and a brief state­ ment that Pope Symmachus (498-514) built a fountain in the square in front of the entrance to St. Peter’s, and another in front of the nearby church of S. Andrea.82 Except for one of those of Symmachus, which is mentioned again in the twelfth century, none of these fountains is ever again referred to after the account of their building in the Liber Pontificalis,83 However, a fifth Roman church-fountain, that of the Pine-Cone in the middle of St. Peter’s atrium, was much more famous and long-lasting.84 It survived until the demolition of the old church, and its centre-piece is now in the Cortile della Pigna of the Vatican palace. The origins of this fountain are unknown, but they could well go back to the fourth century. With interruptions, when the Aqua Traiana was out of action, the Pine-Cone fountain played throughout late antiquity and the early Middle Ages, and it 80 Paulinus, Carmen xxvii, lines 463-79 (P. Fabre, Essai surla chronologie de Uœuvre de Saint Paulin de Noie (Paris, 1948), 35-8 and 114). Also referred to in Carmen xxviii, lines 31-52 and£p. xxxii. 15 (where their purpose is stated). 81 Paulinus, Carmen xxi, lines 650-858. See also p. 127 n. 27 above. 82 Lib. Pont. i. 242-3 and 262. 83 Twelfth-century reference: De Rossi, Inscr. Christ. ii. 230 no. 103. 84 Krautheimer, Corpus, v. 262-71 for the fountain and its setting.

Waterand Water-Supply

143

may well have been the only public fountain to do so in the whole of western Christendom.85 Charlemagne, or one of his successors, paid it the compliment of setting up a copy in front of the palace-chapel at Aachen.86 A peculiarity of early medieval Rome’s water-supply were the mills on the Janiculum fed by the Aqua Traiana, which feature prominently amongst the reasons for papal repairs to the aqueduct under Honorius I (625-38), Hadrian I (772-95), and Gregory IV (827-44) (see Appendix 3).87 These mills are first recorded in an inscription probably of the fifth century, and were vividly described by Procopius in the sixth century: ‘. . . opposite this flat ground, across the Tiber, it happens that there is a great hill where all the mills of the city have been built of old, because much water is brought by an aque­ duct to the crest of the hill, and rushes down the incline with great force’.88 The interest of the popes in these mills is in one respect very easy to understand: they were necessary amenities in the provision of Rome’s bread. However, it is extremely difficult to explain quite why such a complicated system of milling (involving a mill-race bringing water all the way from Lake Bracciano) should have been continued. The obvious alterna­ tive-floating mills on theTiber—had already been tried out by the Romans, with apparent success, during Witigis’s siege.89 Unless we take seriously the statement by Gregory IV’s bio­ grapher, that before his repair to the Traiana the Romans had no place ‘where they could mill their wheat for food’, mills on the Tiber were probably what the city relied on also during later periods when the mills could not function (as before the aqueduct-repairs of Hadrian and Gregory). Certainly, Tiber mills were the means for grinding Rome’s bread in postmedieval times.90 Obviously a much better head of water 85 See Appendix 3.A for papal repairs to the Traiana, and Lib. Pont. ii. 1 and 34 n. 7 for a probable repair to the fountain itself by Leo III (795-816). 86 Karl der Grosse (exhibition catalogue) (Aachen, 1965), 27 and pi. 1. 87 They are also referred to at Porta Aurelia (Porta S. Pancrazio) by the Einsiedeln Itinerary: Cod. Top. Rom. ii. 190. 88 CIL vi. 1711; Piatner-Ashby, 345; Procopius, Gothic War, i. 19. 8 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 186-7). 89 Procopius, Gothic War, i. 19. 19-27 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 190-3). 90 Krautheimer, R o m e, figs. 57, 58, 190, 209, and 211. These were concen­ trated by the Tiber island, where the current is fastest.

144

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

could be produced on a mill-race down the Janiculum than on the sluggish river, but this advantage would seem to be far outweighed by the problems of maintaining the Traiana aque­ duct. I can only suggest that the Traiana would never have been maintained for the sake of the mills alone, but that they continued to feature in Roman life because they happened to be fed by an aqueduct which also served the all-important function of supplying the water for the baths and fountain at St. Peter’s. Another unique feature of Rome, at least as far as I know, was the public lavatory set up in the square in front of St. Peter’s by Pope Symmachus (498-514). This may well have been flushed with the waste water from a fountain erected at the same time: ‘In the square, below the steps leading up to the atrium, he erected another fountain and built a lavatory [et usum necessitatis humanae fe cit].’91 How long it func­ tioned, and whether other Christian shrines had similar amenities, is unrecorded. There is one area of potential Christian patronage for which no definite evidence survives from Italy—the building of aque­ ducts in order to supply abundant free water for private drinking and washing. This was certainly an area of possible Christian concern: in ninth-century Francia, for instance, Bishop Aldric of Le Mans (832-57) built an aqueduct for his town, which had previously relied on water brought, at a price, from the river Sarthe.92 In Rome, however, for which we have the best evidence for"Christian patronage of water in all Italy, the private needs of the population are never clearly referred to as a motive for papal aqueduct-repair (see Appen­ dix 3). The nearest we get to the needs of the general popu­ lation are vague and ambiguous phrases, such as that used to describe Hadrian I’s repair of the Aqua Virgo, whereby he ‘supplied [satiavit] almost the whole city’ (this is later echoed in the description of Sergius II repairing the Aqua Iovia). From the Liber Pontificalis it seems that the supply of domestic water played a very minor role, if any, as a motive 91 Lib. Pont. i. 262. 92 G. Busson and A. Ledru, eds., ‘Actus pontificum cenomannis in urbe degentium’, Archive Historique du Maine, 2. (1901), 300. Cf. Bede, Historia Ecclesiastica, ii. 16 for King Edwin’s drinking-cups set up on public highways.

Waterand Water-Supply

145

for papal aqueduct-repair. This impression is supported by two facts. Firstly, the papal aqueducts, as far as we know, rarely reached the most densely populated areas of the city. Trastevere, admittedly, was reached by the Traiana on the Janiculum (though domestic needs are never specifically mentioned as a cause for its repair, despite detailed references to the needs of the mills and of St. Peter’s). But the nucleus of settlement in the bend on the other side of the river lay beyond the known reach of the other three early medieval aqueducts: the Virgo, which served the Campus Martius, but was described as fracta at the Via Lata in the Einsiedeln Itinerary; the Iovia, which reached the river at the foot of the Palatine; and the Claudia, which cannot be shown in these centuries to have reached beyond the eastern, relatively empty, half of the city (see Appendix 3 and Fig. 1). Secondly, it is probably significant that, whereas we have no clear evidence of the Christian patronage of aqueducts for ordinary water-supply, we do have evidence of such patronage of wells, which were the most likely replacement of the aque­ ducts as a source of domestic supply. Outside S. Giovanni a Porta Latina an early medieval decorated and inscribed well­ head invites the reader to drink in the words of Isaiah: ‘Every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters’, and another, out­ side S. Marco (the gift of a priest John), repeats this phrase and adds ‘and if anyone charges money for this water, may he be cursed’. Neither well is dated, but both are datable on epigraphic and, in the case of that at S. Giovanni, on artistic grounds as well, to the eighth or ninth centuries.93 These two well-heads obviously represent a sorry state of affairs in Rome, once so abundantly watered; but they also suggest that, although there was now room for the charitable provision of domestic water, this was now normally done through the provision of wells, not aqueducts. At first sight a letter of Cassiodorus suggests that, in a different part of Italy and in an earlier period, water for drinking was a major concern of church patronage. The letter, Variae iv. 31, written in the name of Theodoric, orders a certain Bishop Aemilianus to complete the repair of an aque­ duct which he had begun ‘by our authority’.94 Aemilianus’ 93 372.

W. Buchowiecki, Handbuch der Kirchen R o m s, ii (Vienna, 1970), 120 and 94 He may have been bishop of Vercelli: Ruggini, 331.

146

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

efforts are compared to those of Moses bringing forth water from the rock to satisfy the thirsty Israelites: ‘For what could be more appropriate than that a holy priest should provide water for his thirsty flock, and that his human atten­ tions should meet the needs of those whom he should also nourish spiritually?’ While certainly showing how easily and effectively water-patronage could be depicted in flowery Christian terms, this letter is unfortunately not a precise record of the motives of Aemilianus* repair. He was certainly restoring an aqueduct, with royal authority (since it involved a public building); but it is possible that he was doing this for some limited end, such as supplying a clerical bath. Presum­ ably, since Theodoric intervened to speed things up, some public benefit was envisaged, but this certainly need not have been the provision of drinking-water that the Moses image suggests.95 IV

Besides the baths for the clergy and those for the poor, the only other piped water-supply and bath-buildings recorded in early medieval Italy are those with strictly limited access, in palaces or in large private houses. The bath and water-supply of this type we know most about were those in the papal Lateran palace. In contrast to the situation in the rest of Italy, where bishops seem to have shared their bath-buildings with the urban clergy, in Rome the pope maintained a personal and lavish establishment. The Lateran bath-house is first mentioned in 664, when the emperor Constans II is recorded to have bathed in it.96 Under 95 This letter can be taken to show that the Ostrogoths used bishops in the local administration of buildings, in other words, that Aemilianus was acting on behalf of the royal government (cf. Justinian, C odex, i. 4. 26 of 530 for bishops in the East and their role in supervising local public building). However, in the absence of other good evidence, I find it easier to interpret the letter in the sense of Aemilianus acting on his own initiative and for his own ends, but none the less requiring government permission and incurring government supervision, since these ends involved a public building. The arguments of S. Mochi Onori, Vescovi e Città (Bologna, 1933), 126-52, that bishops in the fifth and sixth centuries in Italy assumed general control of public works, ignore epigaphic evidence and have been attacked, I believe correctly, by Ruggini, 332-3. 96 Lib. Pont. i. 343.

Waterand Water-Supply

147

Hadrian I (772-95) it features as one of the reasons for repair­ ing the Aqua Claudia (see Appendix 3), and the same pope also restored the portico within the palace which led to it.97 His successor, Leo III (795-816), probably taking advantage of Hadrian’s repair to the Claudia, erected a porphyry fountain in one of the triclinia he built in the palace.98 Finally, Gregory IV (827-44) sumptuously rebuilt the bath-house, which was described as being in urgent need of repair: ‘He restored . . . the bath . . . throughout from the foundations, and decorated it with marble and other fine ornaments. Since before it threatened to collapse through age . . From all this infor­ mation, and in particular from the description of Gregory’s repair, it is quite clear that popes valued highly and derived enjoyment from their bath-house. Outside Rome the evidence is scanty, though palace-baths were probably a common feature. The story of Theodota, cited above, is not good evidence for public baths in late seventh-century Pavia. But it does show that, at least in Paul the Deacon’s time, bathing was considered a feature of Lombard aristocratic life, and it may even be evidence of a royal bath in the palace at Pavia open to aristocrats.100 Better evidence for a palace-bath at Pavia can be found in Historia Langobardorum vi. 20, where it is recorded that the boy-king Liutpert was killed in 701 ‘in balneo’. To the best of my knowledge no palace-baths are recorded in our areas of Byzantine Italy outside Rome, though there must certainly have been one in Ravenna at least. However, in Sicily we hear in a letter of Pope Honorius I (625/38) of the governor of the island being disturbed in his bath in Syracuse by ‘three hun­ dred and more’ prostitutes demanding the replacement of the curator in charge of them.101 The bath mentioned in this extraordinary account could just possibly have been a public one, but is more likely to have been one in the governor’s palace. Besides those in palaces, private baths are occasionally referred to in the charters of early medieval Italy when 97 Ibid. 502-3. 9* Ibid. ii. 11. 99 Ibid. 81. 104 In contrast to Aachen, single-sex bathing seems to have been strictly enforced. 101 Honorius, Ep. xiv (= Migne, Patrologia Latina, 80, col. 481). This was presumably the same bath as that in which Constans II was later killed; Lib. Pont. i. 344.

148

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

particularly large and elaborate houses are described.102 An example is a house in Lucca granted to the church of SS. Pietro e Gregorio in 783: ‘a dwelling-house, which has two storeys [que est solario] , near the church, along with its sur­ rounding land [cum fundam ento] , courtyard, well, barn, and bath . . . \ 103 One category of baths which is never reliably referred to in the early Middle Ages are those that were privately owned, but open to the public for a fee, their aim being to make a profit. These were a common type of bath in classical times, attracting a slightly more exclusive and affluent clientele than the great public baths of the towns.104 Commercial baths of this kind are last reliably recorded in the late fourth and early fifth centuries in Rome.105 Amongst the endowments of Pope Damasus’ church of S. Lorenzo (366-84) is listed a bath rendering 27 solidi per annum, and amongst those of Vestina’s church of S. Vitale (401-17) another rendering 40 solidi-, both of these must have been commercially-run establishments.106 Why these commercial baths should subsequently disappear (as seems to have happened) demands explanation, since there would seem to be a large slice of the population, not served by the charity baths or by the private baths of the clergy and the highest aristocracy, which might well have patronized such establishments. In part the explanation may lie in an erosion of urban wealth, though documents like the Lucca charters seem to show a society that could have sup­ ported at least one paying public bath if it had wanted to. Another possible explanation is a change of taste, not away from cleanliness and bathing in themselves, but away from the tradition of public mingling in bath or forum which characterised the civilized classical ideal. In Pompeii we find this public classical ideal affecting bathing habits very strongly 103 For examples in Ravenna and Rimini: M. Cagiano de Azevedo, ‘Le case descritte dal Codex Traditionum Ecclesiae Ravennatis’, A tti della Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei. Rendiconti della classe di scienze morali, storiche e filo ­ logiche,2 7 (1972), 160-4. 103 Bert. i. no. 92. 104 Examples of such baths in Rome: Platner-Ashby, 68-71. An advertisement for one at Pompeii: CIL x. 1063. 105 Amongst the 856 balnea recorded in early fourth-century Rome (seep. 121 n, 7 above) many may have been of this type (others were probably wholly private). 106 S. Lorenzo: Lib. Pont. i. 213. S. Vitale: Lib. Pont. i. 222.

Water and Water-Supply

149

in early imperial times: no new private bath-suites were added to the twenty-two built in private houses in republican times, and six of these latter even disappear.107 It is just poss­ ible that in the early Middle Ages taste reverted back towards more private forms of washing. This is, however, impossible to prove, and it seems, for instance, from the archaeological evidence of Ostia that public bathing was still very much the fashion there in the fourth and early fifth centuries, since only one of the splendid late antique houses discovered in the town has its own bath-suite.108 V

In the last section of this chapter I should like to assess briefly the extent and limitations of the new Christian patronage in relation to the old. One basic fact will, I hope, by now be obvious: the ‘water­ less Middle Ages’ were not nearly as dry as they are sometimes made out to be. Nor indeed were they without sophistication. Although baths on the scale recorded in our period could probably be run reasonably satisfactorily with well- andcistemwater, the sophistication of piped water often existed.109 So too did heated and elaborately decorated bath-houses, and, on a more mundane level, at least one town with satisfactory drains-cum-sewers. On the other hand, in comparison with the classical period, the achievement was very limited. The new patronage, besides the digging of the occasional well, seems to have been little concerned with the provision of a domestic water-supply. Whereas in the classical period, even if this seems to have been almost incidental to the need for water for the baths, piped domestic supply for the rich and public cisterns for 101 Guida di Pompei, 39. Roman public lavatories were also startlingly *unprivate’ by modem standards: their users sat around the walls of an unpartitioned room. 108 Meiggs, 420. For the decline of baths in Byzantine Constantinople: Mango, 338-41. 109 Baths without aqueducts: those of Pompeii (before Augustus built the aqueduct) worked on well-water. An inscripton at S. Paolo (cited on p. 137 n. 60 above) refers to lifting-devices for water: 4(r)otas fecit, aquam in valine(o) [= balneo) per mangana fecit*.

150

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

everyone else were common features. In ancient Rome we even hear, through Frontinus, of such sophistications as an attempt to link each cistern to two separate aqueducts, in order to ensure that there was never a shortage while a channel was being repaired, and of attempts to use the highly praised Marcia water as much as possible for drinking only.110 The early medieval well-head at S. Marco, with the evidence it provides that even well-water might be sold, is a very far cry from all this. Even with the baths, for which there is plenty of evidence of Christian patronage, we find the achievement is strictly limited. The vast secular public baths and the smaller commerciallyrun establishments disappear from the record and are replaced by bath-houses, either entirely private for the ruling classes, or run for very limited sections of the population: the clergy itself, or the poor and infirm. Probably the lowest rungs of society did much better under the new dispensation than under the old. But the rest of the population, below the ranks of the aristocracy and the clergy, did much worse than in classical times, when it had been assiduously wooed by secular munificence. It is important to stress this point, because it is all too possible to depict the Church and Christian patronage stepping easily and fully into the shoes of classical munificence, whereas in fact Christian charity differed from secular munifi­ cence not only in its motivation, but also in its scope. We see this contrast even more clearly in an area of patron­ age which I have so far skated round, since it is a vast subject and has little to do with building: the provision of gifts of food and money. However, because it can serve so well to illustrate the transition from secular to Christian munificence, I hope I can be allowed a brief digression in this direction. Such gifts were a common feature of classical munificence, and in Rome itself this involved a complex State-run system of supply, the annona.111 In late antiquity and in the early Middle Ages, Christian charity, and in Rome the charitable 110 Frontinus, 87 and 91-2. 11* For classical munificence of this type: Hands; also Toller and Mrozek (works cited on p. 3 n. 1 above). For the annona: D. Van Berchem, Les Distribu­ tions de blé et d'argent d la plèbe romaine sous l'Empire (Geneva, 1939).

Water and Water-Supply

151

machine of the papacy, did undoubtedly gradually replace what had gone before. In some ways this can be seen as a smooth and easy transition, with only the motivation behind the gifts changing significantly. Thus we still find in the fourth century occasional instances of munificent secular gifts of food and money by the aristocracy; but at the very end of the century we encounter the first references to Christian charity in the same medium, which can then be documented throughout our period.112 Equally we learn from Procopius’ Secret History that, by Ostrogothic times, at least a part of the Roman State-run annona had already been Christianized to the extent that it was distributed to the needy outside St. Peter’s.113 In the course of the later sixth and the seventh centuries, as the Roman state annona fades from the record, we find more and more evidence of a papal and Christian system of food-distribution through the diaconiae, and from archaeological evidence it even seems that at least some of these were established in the old State-run warehouses.114 However, there was not only continuity; there was also considerable change. Classical gifts of food and money had not been aimed principally at the indigent; on the contrary, the higher one’s status and wealth, the more food or money one was likely to be given. The emphasis was not on satisfying Uî Fourth-century secular gifts: Mrozek, ‘Munificentia’, 558-68. He docu­ ments five well-dated, and one other case of such munificence in Italy between 523 and 370, and sees these as a strong revival of the practice after a gap in 2 7 1 -3 2 3 .1 think this argument for a powerful revival is exaggerated and that the practice, though surviving in the fourth century, can hardly be considered to have flourished (contrast Mrozek’s sixty-eight second-century examples). For another example of fourth-century munificence: Claudian, Pan. Prob, et Olybr. Consul., lines 42-55. Early examples of Christian gifts in Italy: a rich woman giving money to the poor at St. Peter’s in 384 (Jerome,Ep. xxxii. 32); Pammachius feeding the poor at St. Peter’s in 397 (Paulinus, Ep. xiii. 11); Paula giving money to the poor before 404 (Jerome, Ep. cviii. 16). For Christian charity in the East: Procopius, Buildings, passim ; Liebeschuetz, 2 3 9 -4 0 (on Antoich). 1.3 Procopius, Secret History, xxvi. 28-30 (Loeb edition, voi. vi. pp. 312-13): ‘And to the beggars who had their station beside the Church of Peter the Apostle, he [= Theodoric] ordered that the Treasury should for ever supply each year 3,000 measures of com .’ 1.4 Diaconiae: O. Bertolini, ‘Per la storia delle diaconie romane nell’alto medioevo sino alle fine del secolo V ili’, Archivio della Società Romana di Storia Patria, 70 (1947), 1-145: R. Vielliard, Recherches sur les origines de la Rom e chrétienne, 2nd edn. (Rome, 1959), 116-23. Taking over State horrea: Krautheimer, Corpus, iv. 287-8 (S. Maria in Cosmedin, S. Teodoro and S. Maria in Via Lata).

152

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

need (though this was often met), but on providing plenty.115 The Christian ideal was very different: charity was for the poor alone, and furthermore it was intended to provide only for their essential necessities. As Jerome wrote of a noble Roman benefactor: ‘She divided up her gifts in such a way as to provide for individual need, not for luxury [non ad luxuriam, sed ad necessitatem] . From her no pauper went empty away.’116 What Jerome wrote of gifts of food and money was pre­ cisely what we have seen in the case of Christian waterpatronage: a move away from luxuria to necessitas. The main beneficiaries of this move were the poor (and the souls of the givers), and the main losers were the rest of the urban popula­ tion, who thereby lost their baths, their annona, their free banquets, and their money. Although we have no evidence of what they felt about the loss of their baths, there is one poss­ ible piece of evidence for their feelings about money gifts. Ammianus Marcellinus tells a story set in Rome before 365, in which Ceionius Volusianus, faced with an ungrateful and unruly mob at his magnificent praetorian games, showed his contempt for them by summoning beggars from the Vatican and granting them largesse: ‘so as to show both his generosity and his contempt for the crowd, he had some beggars fetched from the Vatican and heaped great riches on them’.117 Vol­ usianus was himself a pagan, and it seems probable that what he was doing was showing the crowd that, when it misbehaved, he too would ignore traditions of classical munificence and give only to the poor. This was presumably a lesson that the crowd would well understand and take seriously. The limitations of early medieval water-patronage were not only dictated by the narrowing of the areas of concern; they were in part enforced by financial stringency. This is very difficult to prove, since patrons were keen to stress not the limitations but the scope of their patronage; but it is strongly suggested by restrictions both in the quantity and in the scale lls For the contrast between classical and Christian ideals and practice: Hands, especially pp. 60-1, 77-8, and 90-2. 116 Jerome, Ep. cviii. 16. For this change of ideals and practice in the eastern Empire: Patlagean, 181-96. 117 Amm. Marc, xxvii. 3. 6. For the man: PLRE I, Volusianus 5; Bloch, ‘Pagan Revival’, 205.

Water and Water-Supply

153

of the Christian amenities that replaced those of classical antiquity. It is possible to argue, in a case like the clerical and charity baths, that their limited number and limited size were dictated by a restriction in need.118 However, it is much harder to see why, when amenities like fountains in front of churches were obviously appreciated, so few should be re­ corded, unless we assume that they could only be afforded in exceptional cases (as at St. Peter’s). In one case, the aqueducts of Rome, we are able to test the claims of contemporary documents against the harsh realities of archaeological evidence; and this reveals an interesting story. The Liber Pontificalis, describing papal repairs to the aqueducts (see Appendix 3), often tells of very extensive work indeed, amounting on occasion to complete rebuilding ‘a fundamentis’ or ‘a novit er’ (e.g. both Hadrian I and Gregory IV with the Aqua Traiana). However, although archaeological research has revealed many traces of small Very late’ repairs to several of the aqueducts, on none of them has a really major early medieval campaign of rebuilding, buttressing, etc. been detected. The Liber Pontificalis shows what the popes would like to have done, but the material evidence is more reliable for what they were actually able to do; and this was strictly limited.119 Whether restrictions on the patronage of water in the early Middle Ages had a marked effect on the hygiene of towns is, I fear, impossible to tell. The end of secular public bathbuildings certainly meant that people bathed less; but it did not necessarily mean that they ceased to wash, since they could still do this in basins and tubs at home, though one might suspect that it would at least lead them to wash rather less thoroughly and less often. Equally, the decline of the public lavatory, and of waste aqueduct-water to flush drains, 1,8 Since no bath of this kind has been fully excavated in Italy, it is impossible to prove categorically that they were small. Only parts of one bath, that of the clergy of Ravenna, have ever been found (these are now displayed outside the Museo Archeologico at S. Vitale). However, the very fact that so few remains of early medieval baths have been found (unlike classical bath-houses) suggests that they were small. 119 One word of caution. The aqueducts, though very thoroughly studied by Ashby and Van Deman, have never been looked at by an archaeologist specifically interested in their post-antique history. A re-examination might prove rewarding.

154

The Rise o f Christian Patronage

must have had some effect on hygiene, but may largely have been compensated for by a probable decrease in the density and size of urban populations, leaving plenty of open spaces for cesspits. What is certain, however, is that even if early medieval townsmen did manage to keep clean and dispose of sewage satisfactorily, this will have involved them in more effort and less enjoyment than their classical predecessors.

PART III THE NECESSITIES OF AN URBAN SOCIETY AND ADMINISTRATION

The aim of this section of the book is to explore the area of public building where there was most continuity: the con­ struction and maintenance of those buildings essential to an urban society and to an urban-based administration. I shall take first the buildings most needed by the adminis­ tration, the public palaces, in Chapter 8, and then in Chapter 9 deal with the public buildings essential both to the govern­ ment and to the security and smooth running of urban society : the city walls, streets, and bridges. Because in these areas of public building there was little change, the story is a duller one than that of the change from munificence to charity; but it is a story that has to be documented fully, since it proves, through the buildings, the continuity of town life and of urban administration in early medieval Italy.

8

Palaces Both the secular and ecclesiastical administrations of Italy never ceased to be based on the city. In the field of public building this is reflected in the continued maintenance and addition to palaces. In writing about ‘palaces’ in late antiquity and the early Middle Ages I must make it clear what I mean by the term, since at the time there was a varied, changing, but also very specific vocabulary in use, ranging from palatium, used in Lombard times only for major royal residences, down to domus episcopi and curs ducis for the seats of bishops and dukes. Fortunately, the problems of terminology that this variation raises have been very fully explored by Brühl, and I shall, therefore, for the most part side-step the issue by con­ sidering under the English term ‘palaces’ all those residences which passed by descent of office, and not by descent of family; in this way I am able to include under one term of convenience the homes of kings, dukes, and bishops.1 I have divided the chapter into three sections of very unequal length, dealing in turn with imperial and royal palaces, those of local secular governors, and those of bishops. I

Unfortunately, we are not well informed about the late antique imperial palaces of fourth- and fifth-century Italy. The great sprawling palace in Rome itself, on the Palatine, was certainly maintained (in the fourth century by a prae­ positus palatii Palatini) but probably little added to, since Rome had ceased to be a common imperial residence after 1 For terminology: works of Brühl (cited in bibliography); above all Brühl, ‘Königs’, 401-8.

158

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

312.2 Fourth-century Milan, and probably also Aquileia, must have had large and impressive imperial palaces, but almost nothing is known about either. Ravenna, which became the main imperial residence after 402/3, must have been provided with a suitable palace by the emperor who moved there, Honorius; but of this we have no information. According to Agnellus in the ninth century, Valentinian III built in Ravenna the palace ‘ad Laure ta* (where Odoacre was killed by Theodoric in 493); the attribution of this palace to Valentinian may have been based on an inscription still legible in Agnellus’ day. It is most likely that this palace was not a separate entity from an earlier residence of Honorius, but a substantial addition to it (like the palaces of Domitian and Septimius Severus added on to Rome’s Palatine complex).4 Two very obscure poems of Valentinian’s court poet Flavius Merobaudes perhaps describe parts of this building.5 Until recently it used to be thought that Galla Placidia built her own separate palace near her church of S. Croce, but there is no contemporary evidence of this and it is now thought to be a medieval invention.6 With the coming of the Ostrogoths there is suddenly much more evidence available on royal palaces. It is quite clear that this is not entirely through the chance survival of more evi­ dence. It is also because the Ostrogoths, in line with the Roman veneer of their rule, took palace-building very seriously. The building of palaces is mentioned in three con­ temporary sources when giving brief summaries of the achievements of Theodoric as a builder.7 Furthermore, in the 2 Praepositus: mentioned in CIL x. 6441 of c.355 (though not in the Notitia Dignitatum). 3 N. Duval, ‘Les Palais impériaux de Milan et d’Aquilée. Réalité et mythe’, Antichità Altoadriatiche, 4 (1973), 151-8. Storia di Milano, i. 549-57. 4 Valentinian: Agnellus, RR.II.SS. 115. Odoacre: Anon. Vales., c. 55 (p. 320). General: Deichmann, Geschichte, 41-4. Palatine: Platner-Ashby, 158-66; Nash,i. 316-38. 5 F. M. Clover, ‘Flavius Merobaudes. A Translation and Historical Commentary’, • Transactions o f the American Philosophical Society, vol. 61 part 1 (1971), Carmina I and II. 6 Deichmann, G eschichte,4\-2. 7 Anon. Vales., c. 71 (p. 324); Cassiodorus, Chronica, 160: ‘consurgunt admiranda palatia’; Ennodius, Panegyricus, 210: ‘Video . . . sub civilitatis plenitudine palatina ubique tecta rutilare.’ Theodoric’s palaces also later earned a special mention by the Frankish historian Fredegar: Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Scriptores rerum Merovingicarum, ii. 82.

Palaces

159

documents of the Ostrogothic administration, the Variae of Cassiodorus, the importance of the palace as a suitable façade for power is carefully and precisely stressed. In Variae i. 6 Cassiodorus wrote: ‘The increase of the State’s power is worthy of a king, and it is certainly right for him to add to the splendour of his palaces with new buildings.’ In Variae vii. 5, the formula of a palace architect, is the even more detailed and explicit statement: Palaces are the delight o f our power, the fine face of our rule, and the honoured witness o f our kingship. Admiring ambassadors are shown the palace, and from their view o f it they form their first impressions of the king. A thoughtful king therefore greatly enjoys a beautiful palace and relaxes his mind, tired out by public cares, in the pleasure of the building.

To the greatest palace of his kingdom, the Palatine in Rome, Theodoric, like his predecessors in power, probably added or altered little, since he very seldom used this magnifi­ cent pile. However, the Anonymus Valesianus does record that the yearly 200 lb of gold from the arca vinaria set aside as a general restoration fund for Rome were intended as much for the palace as any other building: ‘he ordered that 200 pounds from the wine fund [arca vinaria] be set aside for the repair of the palace and the restoration of the city’s public buildings’.8 Three new palaces are attributed to Theodoric by con­ temporary and later sources.9 That at Pavia is recorded by the Anonymus Valesianus (‘At Pavia he built a palace’), and later by Fredegar and Agnellus of Ravenna. It is in fact un­ likely that Theodoric built wholly anew in Pavia, or else­ where, since there must certainly have already existed in the town a local governor’s residence {praetorium) suitable for adaptation and addition.10 From Agnellus we learn that the Pavian palace included a mosaic representation of Theodoric on horseback, which must certainly have been of Ostrogothic date : ‘I saw a portrait of him on horseback in mosaic in the vault of the tribunal [in tribunalis cameris].' Unfortunately, 8 Anon. Vales., c. 67 (p. 324). For archaeological remains of such repairs: Platner-Ashby, 163-4. 9 See p. 158 n. 7 above and Agnellus, R R JI.S S . 227-9. 10 Brühl, Fodrum , 360; id., ‘Königs’, 404-5.

160

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

there are problems in understanding exactly where the mosaic stood in the palace, since the phrase ‘in tribunalis cameris’ is obscure.11 However, this same mosaic is probably what is being referred to in 906/10, when a royal judgement was held ‘in the palace, in the great laubia called “under Theodoric” [ubi sub Teuderico dicitur] \ 12 If so, it must have been a prominent feature both to catch Agnellus’ eye and to give its name to a laubia (probably a colonnaded area or loggia). After the burning of Pavia in 924 and the subsequent rebuilding of the palace, the mosaic is never mentioned again.13 About the palace at Verona, also attributed to Theodoric by the Anonymus Valesianus and Fredegar, we know only two things. Firstly, according to the Anonymus, that Theodoric linked it to a gate in the city walls with a porticoed street: ‘Similarly at Verona . . . he built a palace, and added a portico all the way from the city gate to it.’ This was certainly built in order to provide a suitable backdrop for royal arrivals and departures from the city.14 Secondly, from later sources (including the Iconographia Ratheriana, which clearly shows it: Fig. 4), we know that the palace was built in the Castrum, a small fortified nucleus on the other side of the River Adige from the main settlement. About Theodoric’s palace- at Ravenna we are better in­ formed. First, the Anonymus Valesianus (who was probably a Ravennate writer) tells us that Theodoric completed a palace at Ravenna (and only failed to dedicate it) and built 11 Elsewhere in Agnellus tribunal is used for the sanctuary of a church: hence perhaps here the apse of a ceremonial room. Alternatively, it could mean a cere­ monial courtyard in front of a suite of rooms, in the sense of the Byzantine Tptßovvakuov, used in the tenth-century Liber de Ceremoniis. In view of the 906/10 document (see below), the latter sense is perhaps the more likely. 12 C. Manaresi, ed., I Placiti del 4Regnum Italiae’, i (Rome, 1955), no. 122 (AD 906/10) (= Fonti per la Storia d ’Italia, pubblicate dall’Istituto Storico Italiano, 92). This is best interpreted as referring to the mosaic, which Agnellus reliably recorded as being of Theodoric and in the palace, and not to the statue of the ‘Regisole* (see below), for which there is no other evidence to suggest either an attribution to Theodoric or a location in the palace. 13 For the rebuilding: Manaresi, ed. cit. (previous note), i, nos. 136 and 144 (preambles). 14 For late Roman Adventus ceremonial: S. MacCormack, A rt and Ceremony in Late A ntiquity (Berkeley, 1981), 17-89. For late antique porticoed streets in the eastern Empire: Claude, 60-8; C. Foss, Byzantine and Turkish Sardis (Cambridge, Mass., 1976), 42-5; id., Ephesus after A ntiquity (Cambridge, 1979), 56 and 65-7.

Palaces

161

porticoes around it: ‘He fully completed a palace but did not dedicate it. He built porticoes around it.’ The presence of the porticoes, as at Verona, shows that Theodoric’s ceremonial design included the approaches, and not just the palace itself. Secondly, Agnellus in the ninth century was able to describe a mosaic in this palace which had recently disappeared. This mosaic stood somewhere near the entrance to the palace, near the church of S. Salvatore (unless two different mosaics are described: one by the entrance, and the other in the tribunal of the ‘triclinium ad mare’): Here at Ravenna there was a similar mosaic [to that at Pavia], in the palace which he himself built. It was in the tr ib u n a l of the dining-hall [ t r ic lin iu m ] which is called ad m a r e , above the door, and on the façade o f the palace o f this city, which is called A d C a lc h i, where the first door o f the palace was, in the place which is called S ic r e s t u m , approximately where the church of S. Salvatore now is [ u b i e c c le s ia S a lv a to r is e s s e v i d e t u r ]. In the pinnacle [ p i n n a c u lu m ] of this same place there was a figure of Theodoric, beautifully made in mosaic, in his right hand hold­ ing a lance, in his left a shield, and wearing a breastplate. On the shieldside stood a personification in mosaic of Rome, with spear and helmet; on the lance-side was a similar figure of Ravenna, approaching the King with her right foot on the sea and her left on the dry land .15

Thirdly, excavation in 1908-14 in the probable area of Theodoric’s building (just south of S. Apollinare and behind the ruin known as the ‘Palazzo di Teodorico’, which may just possibly in fact be part of the church of S. Salvatore), re­ vealed a large building and several superimposed layers of floor-mosaics, including one of geometrical design that could be of the sixth century.16 Fourthly, amongst the mosaics of Theodoric’s time in S. Apollinare Nuovo is one of the front of a building, conveniently labelled ‘p a l a t iu m ’ (Fig. 2). From the evidence of the excavations it would seem that Theodoric was not building anew but rebuilding and adding ,s Agnellus, RR.JI.SS. 227-9. 16 G. Ghirardini, ‘Gli scavi del Palazzo di Teodorico di Ravenna’, M onumenti A ntichi pubblicati per cura della reale Accademia dei Lincei (1918), cols. 738-841. Ghirardini’s datings of the various layers of mosaic have been revised: for a summary of recent thoughts on the subject, see Duval, ‘Comment recon­ naître’, 37-8. For the many theories concerning the ‘Palazzo di Teodorico’: A. Rusconi, ‘Una nuova ipotesi sul cosidetto “Palazzo di Teodorico” in Ravenna’, Corsi di Cultura su llA rte Ravennate e Bizantina, 18 (1971), 475-506; M. Maz­ zoni, TI cosidetto “Palazzo di Teodorico’’ ’, Corsi di Cultura sullA rte Ravennate e Bizantina, 2.1 (1956), 81-6.

162

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

to an older palace-complex, which is what we would expect in Ravenna/7 Indeed, in Variae i. 6 we find specific evidence that at least a part of Theodoric’s building work in the Ravenna palace did involve repair: in this letter he sends to Rome for mosaicists or marble-workers (marmorarios peritissimos) to repair the Basilica Herculis. Although this is not explicitly stated, it is clear from the preamble of the letter, which talks of the extreme importance of rulers decorating palaces (quoted above), that the basilica was an old hall in the imperial palace of Ravenna, possibly containing a mosaic of Hercules.1718 The S. Apollinare mosaic is generally accepted to be a contemporary representation, perhaps rather stylized, of the front of Theodoric’s building. A great deal of scholarly time and paper has been spent on arguing exactly what this mosaic shows: whether a flattened-out representation of a courtyard (such as that in Diocletian’s palace at Split) or a genuinely flat façade.19 For my purposes here, it is fortunately only necessary to agree that, whatever the precise details, the front of the palace was certainly spectacular. Its marble decoration may have been imported from the imperial quarries of Proconnesus, and its design was perhaps modelled on the entrance of the great palace of Constantinople.20 Unfortun­ ately, we do not know quite enough about either building to prove this latter point, nor can we prove that the phrase ‘Ad Calchi’, used by Agnellus in the ninth century to describe the Ravenna palace-entrance (in undoubted imitation of Constantinople’s ‘Chalke’), was a usage dating from the sixth century. Certainly, however, the Ravenna palacefacade was designed to be grand, and to transmit a similar message to that which Justinian in Constantinople meant to convey through his work at the Chalke entrance: ‘We know the lion . . . by his claw, and so those who read this 17 Deichmann, Geschichte, 42-4; Brühl,Fodrum, 361 n. 46. There is, however, no incontrovertible proof that Ghirardini uncovered part of Theodoric’s palace: see Duval, ‘Comment reconnaître’. 18 E. Dyggve, ‘Basilica Herculis’, in Festschrift W. Sas-Zaloziecky (Graz, 1956), 34-9; id., ‘Excursus sulla “Basilica Herculis* ricordata da Cassiodoro’, Corsi di Cultura sull’A rte Ravennate e Bizantina, 3.2 (1957), 75-8. 19 See Dyggve, Duval, and De Francovich. 10 Marble: see p. 216. Constantinople: De Francovich.

Palaces

163

will know the impressiveness of the Palace from the vest­ ibule.’21 In 1951, during restoration work, the S. Apollinare palacerepresentation was lifted, and it was possible to prove an earlier hypothesis: at the time of the rededication of the church to the orthodox faith, after the fall of the Ostrogoths, not only were figures (probably of Theodoric and his court) removed from under the palace-colonnade, but also something was removed from the central tympanum, above the word ‘p a l a t iu m *.22 It seems almost certain that what went was a tiny representation in mosaic of the great mosaic of Theodoric, which Agnellus saw and recorded ‘on the façade of the palace’, ‘above the door’, ‘where the first door of the palace was’, and ‘in the pinnacle of this same place’. By combining the evidence of Agnellus and the S. Apollin­ are mosaic, as I believe we may, we can form a vivid general impression of the façade of Theodoric’s palace and of the awe it was meant to inspire. The visitor faced an entrance dominated by a mosaic of the mounted and armed king flanked by personifications of the greatest cities of his realm, Rome and Ravenna, the old and new capitals. The whole martial and triumphant scene was emphasized by the figure of Victory which the S. Apollinare mosaic shows above each capital (Fig. 2). Both the Ravenna and the Pavia palace-mosaics were certainly meant to impress in the grandest Roman manner. It is also apparent that Theodoric extended his artistic propaganda beyond his palaces, by himself erecting, or ensuring the erection by others, of royal statues and mosaic portraits elsewhere in the towns of Italy. We learn from Isidore of Seville of a gilt bronze statue set up by the Senate of Rome, and, from incidental references in Procopius, of further statues of the king in Rome and of a mosaic represen­ tation in the forum of Naples. In the former case the osten­ sible patron was the Senate, and in neither of the latter cases is it clear who had erected the portraits; but at this date it is certain that in any erection of statues the royal administration 21 Procopius, Buildings, i. 10. 11. (Loeb edition, voi. vii, pp. 84-5). 22 G. Bovini, ‘Antichi rifacimenti nei mosaici di S. Apollinare Nuovo di Ravenna’, Corsi di Cultura sull'Arte Ravennate e Bizantina, 13 (1961), 51-81.

164

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

itself would have been closely involved, perhaps even to the extent of initiating the project.23 Certainly, Theodoric must have ordered the great gilt bronze statue of himself, armed and mounted, to be set up in Ravenna, which was described three hundred years later by Agnellus, thirty-eight years after it had been taken by Charlemagne to Aachen.24 It is some­ times doubted whether this statue in fact represented Theodoric, rather than some earlier emperor; but our source for the attribution, Agnellus, is generally reliable, and he may even have based his statement on an inscription to the king on the stone base of the statue, which he describes in detail and which was almost certainly left behind by Charlemagne: ‘a rectangular pyramid of stone and squared blocks [? = bisalis] almost six cubits high’.25 Unfortunately, we do not have any evidence to prove whether these Ostrogothic statues and palaces in fact had the effect of impressing people which is hoped for by the Variae (see above). However, there is one piece of evidence to suggest that they had a less desirable effect on the Byzantine emper­ ors in the East. Although in many fields, such as coinage, Theodoric and his successors maintained a carefully ambigu­ ous, but slightly subservient constitutional position in relation to the one remaining emperor, in the field of artistic propa­ ganda they seem to have been less cautious.26 A building like the Ravenna palace, with its representation of the armed 23 Rome: Isidore of Seville, Historia Gothorum, M onumenta Germaniae Historica, Auctores Antiquissimi, xi. 283. Rome: Procopius, Gothic War, iii. 20. 29-31 (Loeb edition, voi. iv, pp. 332-3). Naples: Procopius, Gothic War, i. 24. 22-27 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 232-5). For the Roman Senate needing imperial permission before erecting a statue in 384: Symmachus, Rei. 12. Also on imperial control in general: O. von Premerstein, ‘Griechisch-römisches aus Arkadien’, Jahreshefte des österreichischen archäologischen Institutes in Wien, 15 (1912), 215-17. 24 Agnellus, RR.II.SS. 230-1. Agnellus goes on to recount a story (‘Alii aiunt*) that the statue was originally made by Theodoric for Zeno, ‘sed Theodoricus suo nomine decoravit*. This story may have been inspired by Jordanes* account of a statue of Theodoric set up by Zeno in Constantinople: Jordanes, Getica, M onu­ menta Germaniae Historica, Auctores Antiquissim i, v. 1, p. 132. 25 Doubts: e.g. Deichmann, Geschichte, 41. Inscription: Agnellus* reference to ‘Theodoricus suo nomine decoravit’ (see preceding note) could be to an inscription he had seen. 26 Constitution: A. H. M. Jones, ‘The Constitutional Position of Odoacer and Theoderic*, Journal o f Roman Studies, 52 (1962), 126-30. The Senigallia medal­ lion is also a clear statement of martial independence.

Palaces

165

Theodoric greeted by his cities of Rome and Ravenna (with no reference at all to the eastern emperor), was undoubtedly an artistic statement of proud, victorious autonomy. It is not surprising to find that this did not go down well in Byzantium : one of the clauses of a treaty between Theodahad and Jus­ tinian was ‘that no statue of bronze or of any other material should ever be set up to Theodahad alone, but statues must always be made for both, and they must stand: on the right that of the emperor, and on the other side that of Theoda­ had’.27 Interestingly enough, despite the awkwardness of Theo­ doric’s statues and mosaics to a Roman view of a united Empire, these were not destroyed after Justinian’s reconquest, presumably because of the high regard felt for the Gothic king.28 Only two cases of destruction are recorded, and both were certainly exceptional. Theodoric’s statue and mosaic representation in Ravenna stood untouched until the early ninth century, and the mosaic representation in Pavia until 924. One case of destrue tion was during the purging of the Arian churches of all traces of Gothic use, before their rededication to the orthodox faith: in S. Apollinare, and probably elsewhere, this almost certainly involved removing mosaic representations of Theodoric (see above). The other was a case in Rome, where Rusticiana, daughter of Sym­ machus and wife of Boethius, revenged herself on Theodoric by destroying his statues in the city; however, this was clearly a piece of private revenge, and not official Byzantine policy, since she had to bribe the Greek commanders before acting.29 Before finally leaving the subject of the Ostrogoths and their palaces, one more point deserves to be made. Their palace-building and decoration shows these barbarians at their most Roman and their most proud. However, the loca­ tion of Theodoric’s three main residences illustrates a darker side to Gothic rule: the need in troubled times for militarily powerful bases. Ravenna had been chosen as a capital for its impregnable (if insalubrious) position as early as 402/3, and its defensive strength was brought home to Theodoric himself 27 Procopius, Gothic War, i. 6. 5 (Locb edition, voi. iii, pp. 50-1). 28 High regard: Procopius, Gothic War, i. 1. 26-39 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 10-15). 29 See Procopius as cited on p. 164 n. 23 above.

166

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

during his frustrating three-year siege there of his rival Odoacre.30 Pavia and Verona were, however, Gothic choices as capitals, since neither had been normal residences of rulers before. In both cases defensive needs were probably the main reason behind the choice. Pavia in the late Empire had been overshadowed by the nearby imperial capital of Milan. Iron­ ically, it was probably the very size of Milan, with its four and a half kilometres of city wall, that led Theodoric to choose instead the smaller, and therefore more easily de­ fended, Pavia as his capital. When threatened in Milan early in his Italian career by Odoacre and Tufa, he retreated out of the city and defended instead the shorter walled circuit of Pavia: ‘he moved to smaller Pavia [ad Ticinensis civitatis angustiam]*.31 During his reign Theodoric himself added to the fortifications of Pavia, and in the Gothic Wars it was used as a deposit for valuables by all the Goths of the region, ‘being a place which had strong defences’.32 The whole of Verona too was a powerfully defended town, but here Theodoric chose as his palace-site an exceptionally strong position. It stood in the Castrum, an area fortified by a natural hill and by man-made defences (again, Theodoric probably added to these).33 This area of the town had the great strategic advan­ tage that it could be defended by comparatively few men independently of the main settlement, as long as the two bridges linking it to the other side of the Adige were held. In 541, indeed, when faced with treachery in Verona, the Goths did apparently retreat over the Adige and hold the Castrum alone.34 After Ostrogothic times there is far less evidence of royal or imperial palace-building in Italy. This is certainly in part because we have less evidence for the later period; but it must 30 On Ravenna see p. 123. 31 Ennodius, Vita Epifani, c. 111 (p. 98). 32 Procopius, Gothic War, ii. 12. 32 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 394-5). Theodoric’s defences: Anon. Vales., c. 71 (p. 324). 33 See Chapter 9, section III. 34 Procopius, Gothic War, iii. 3. 14-15 (Loeb edition, vol. iv, pp. 176—7) ; it is just possible from this account that they left the town altogether. In the tenth century the strategic advantages of the Castrum were described by Liutprand of Cremona, Antapodosis, ii. 40: 'si ea pars civitatis, quam memoratus fluvius dexteram alluit, ab hostibus capiatur, ea [= the Castrum] tamen viriliter possit defendi’.

Palaces

167

also be because, after the fall of the Ostrogoths, no rulers in Italy made quite such a show of their power. However, although there is little evidence for the addition of much that was new, there is plenty of evidence for the maintenance of the old. In Ravenna, at least the addition to the palace built by Theodoric was maintained sufficiently to be described by Agnellus, and is recorded in use by the exarch in the late seventh century.35 However, the so-called ‘Palace of Theo­ doric’, which is sometimes called the ‘Palace of the Exarch’, is not now thought to be either of these buildings.36 In Rome the Palatine seems to have been maintained by the Byzantine secular administration longer than any other building: the epitaph of Plato (ob. 688), father of Pope John VII, states that he held the office of curator palatii, which makes him the last secular official ever recorded in charge of one of Rome’s buildings.37 In the century and a half between the fall of the Ostrogoths and the death of Plato the Palatine was occasionally used. It was almost certainly where Constans II stayed during his visit to the city in 664: the Liber Pontifi­ calis, which is our source for this event, does not specifically refer to the Palatine, but does make it clear that the Emperor was not staying in either of the two most likely alternatives, the Lateran and the Vatican.38 The Palatine was also where the icons of the ruling emperors sent from Constantinople were displayed, in the chapel of S. Cesareo (at least in AD 603), and where in 687 the Romans elected one of the three rival candidates to the papacy.39 After the seventh century, for obvious political reasons, the popes preferred not to allow any secular ruler to occupy this intramural seat of Empire (see below), and the Palatine was next used only in the late tenth century, when Otto III probably established his Roman palace here.40 From the Lombard kingdom there is plenty of evidence of urban palaces being used by kings: not only the major residences, the palatia, but also the lesser curtes regiae in 35 Agnellus, RR.ÏI.SS. 227-9, and id., MGH, 365. 36 See p. 161 n. 16 above. 37 De Rossi, Inscr. Christ. ii. 442 no. 152. 38 Lib. P o n t i. 343. 39 603: Gregory, Ep. xiii. 1. 687: Lib. P o n t i. 371 and 377-8 nn. 11 and 12. 40 For Otto III on the Palatine (not, as is often supposed, on the Aventine): Brühl, ‘Kaiserpfalz’, 18-30.

168

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

other towns.41 Most, if not all, of these palaces must have been inherited from earlier times; and very little is known of Lombard repair work or additions, though obviously at least basic maintenance must have been continuous. The building we know most about is the main royal palace, that of Pavia, which as a residence and administrative centre features prominently in Paul the Deàcon’s History and in the royal charter.42 At least part of the building was the work of Theodoric, and this part, with the mosaic of the Ostrogothic king, was maintained throughout the Lombard period. We also know that the palace probably had its own bath-suite, though there is no way of knowing when this was installed (see Chapter 7, section iv). Certainly the palace of Pavia was in Lombard times a dominant and admired building in the city, since an early eighth-century inscription describes the splendour of Theodota’s monastery in these words: ‘nor do buildings exist in this world to rival it, except the palaces of kings’.43 Of Lombard additions to the Pavian palace the only certain evidence comes from the reign of Liutprand (712-44), who, according to Paul the Deacon, added to it a palace-chapel, and by so doing apparently stole a march on all the other kings of Europe: ‘Inside his palace he built a chapel of S. Salvatore, and installed priests and clerks to sing the holy office for him daily, which at that time no other kings had.’44 Of a slightly earlier period Paul the Deacon recorded that ‘in these days King Perctarit [672-88] splendidly [opere mirifico] rebuilt at Pavia the gate next to the palace, which is called the Porta Palatiensis’.45 This could have been a purely defensive work, but, if so, there is no particular reason why Perctarit should rebuild only the one gate by his palace and why it should be described as ‘opere mirifico’. I think that it 41 C.-R. Brühl, Studien zu den langobardischen Königsurkunden (Tübingen, 1970), Urkundentabella (after p. 237); id. ‘Königs*, 405-8; id. Fodrum , i. 355-8. I am not treating the evidence for rural palaces, of which the most famous was Corte olona, probably built by Liutprand (though first documented under the Carolingians). 42 Of twenty-eight royal charters of Lombard times, sixteen were issued in Pavia in palatio, as opposed to two from the palace of Spoleto and one each from those of Milan and Ravenna: Brühl, Fodrum , i. 355. 43 Panazza, no. 66. 44 H ist Lang. vi. 58. 45 Ibid. V. 36. For location of gate and palace: Bullough, ‘Pavia’, 88.

Palaces

169

is much more likely that Perctarit was, in fact, mainly building in order to provide a suitable backdrop to ceremonial exits and entries to the town and palace. City gates in the Roman world were often designed to be splendid as well as strong (witness those of Turin, Verona, Rome, Trier, and Split), and it was particularly important to provide a magnificent gate­ way for a king’s or emperor’s usual path of entry into a town, since the ceremonial of a ruler’s Adventus was of great impor­ tance in antiquity.46 In papal Rome we know for certain that rulers were greeted ceremonially outside the gates and accom­ panied by processions into the city throughout the early Middle Ages.47 In Pavia we cannot prove continuity of the practice, though it is strongly suggested by descriptions in Paul’s H istory, such as that of the return to the city of Cunicpert in c.688 after the defeat of his rival Alachis: ‘the King himself, with general rejoicing and triumph at his victory, returned to Pavia’.48 It was, I believe, for this kind of function that Perctarit rebuilt ‘opere mirifico’ the gate nearest the palace. The evidence concerning the Pavia palace suggests that the Lombards, though scarcely matching the Ostrogoths, were not wholly insensitive to the role of palace architecture as a backdrop to the display of power. One Lombard king, Agilulf (591-616), was perhaps more interested in this aspect of kingship than any other, and fortunately we know a little about one palace built during his reign, that at Monza. Agilulf’s style of kingship does seem to have been peculiarly Roman, and, in this, very close to that of the Ostrogoths. Alone of all the Lombard sole rulers of the kingdom he appears to have favoured Milan over Pavia as a residence, perhaps because of its history as an imperial capital, and in 604 he had his son Adaloald proclaimed co-ruler in Milan’s circus, in clear imita­ tion of Byzantine ceremonial use of the hippodrome.49 He is 46 For the gates of Verona and Rome, decorated with statues and inscriptions: Marconi, Verona, 83-95; Richmond, 31-5 and 178-9. For Adventus, see p. 160 n. 14 above. 47 e.g. Hist. Lang. v. 11 (Constans II in 664)\L ib. Pont. i. 497 (Charlemagne in 774, stated to be normal practice for an exarch); Lib. Pont. ii. 88 (Lothar II in 844). # 48 Hist. Lang. v. 41. 49 Milan: Hist. Lang. iii. 35 (proclaimed king here in 591); Hist. Lang. iv. 28 (leaves Milan on campaign in 602); Brühl, CDL iii.l (?613), his only surviving

170

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

also the only Lombard king who is known to have produced bricks from royal kilns with stamped inscriptions, imitating those of the emperors and of the Ostrogothic kings.50 Finally, the Roman mould of his ceremonial is confirmed by the ‘helmet of Agilulf’, a gilt-bronze plaque depicting the king (identified by an inscription), enthroned and flanked by warriors, to whom two Victories are presenting subjects offering homage.51 Though crude in execution, this represen­ tation belongs firmly within a late Roman and Ostrogothic tradition of the exaltation of kingship. For palace-building in Agilulf’s reign there is record from Paul the Deacon of a new summer residence at Monza, north of Milan, built by the queen, Theodolinda, who also built here the basilica of S. Giovanni Battista: ‘There the queen also built for herself a palace.’52 Bearing in mind Agilulf’s Roman style of ceremonial, we would expect this palace to have been not only a cool retreat from the sweltering Milanese summer, but also a suitable show-piece of kingship. Indeed, the only detail about the palace that Paul records confirms this hypothesis, for, according to him, Theodolinda had the palace decorated with frescos depicting events in Lombard history—Germanic events, but immortalized in a purely Roman medium: ‘. . . in which she had scenes painted, in­ cluding some from Lombard history’.53 Before leaving the northern Lombards, one more point needs to be cleared up. It is sometimes written that a famous statue of a horseman, which stood in front of the cathedral of Pavia until destroyed in 1796 (the ‘Regisole’), was originally in the palace of the city, and even that it came to Pavia as spoils from Ravenna brought by Liutprand or charter is issued ‘Mediolanio in palatio’, Circus: Hist. Lang. iv. 30. After Agilulf, Milan was only used in the exceptional circumstance of the dual kingship of Godepert and Perctarit in 661: Hist. Lang. iv. 51. 50 Found in repairs to S. Simpliciano in Milan: G. P. Bognetti, Santa Maria di Castelseprio (Milan, 1948), 155 and tav. viia; Storia di Milano, ii. 509. 51 O. von Hessen, Secondo contributo alla archeologia longobarda in Toscana: reperti isolati e di provenienza incerta (Florence, 1975), 90-7, and tav. 27-30. Conveniently illustrated by Brown, 128-9. 52 Hist. Lang. iv. 22. According to Paul, iv. 21, Theodoric had also built here a summer palace. 53 Paul had himself seen these, since he goes on to comment on the hair-styles they displayed.

Palaces

171

Aistulf.54 However, the statue is first reliably recorded in Pavia only later in the Middle Ages, when it already stood in front of the cathedral. The only evidence for it ever standing in the palace is a record of a judgement held ‘in the great laubia which is called “under Theodoric” ’, which is much more likely to refer to the mosaic of the Ostrogothic king reliably recorded in the Pavia palace by Agnellus (see above); and the only evidence of a Ravennate origin is all late medi­ eval, and very probably derives from a confusion with the statue of Theodoric taken from Ravenna to Aachen by Charlemagne.55 Though not royal palaces, the buildings of the southern Lombard dukes of Salerno and Benevento are best considered in this section of the chapter, since these rulers were in effect entirely autonomous and not governors of provinces under a higher power. Here the evidence centres around Arechis II (758-87), who was undoubtedly a great builder, not only of palaces, but also of churches and city walls. The most reliably recorded of his palaces is one at Salerno, which is attributed to him by a series of tenth- and eleventh-century sources, including the local Chronicon Salernitanum. 56 According to these, this palace was inscribed with verses by Paul the Deacon, one of which is possibly recorded.57 Most of the same sources also attribute to Arechis, probably reliably, a palace of Benevento (presumably a substantial addition to the existing ducal palace). An attempt by Belting to link to this, as a palacechapel, the surviving centrally planned church of S. Sofia (which was certainly the work of Arechis) has, I think rightly, not met with scholarly approval.58 Even so, Arechis’s achieve­ ment in palace-building was certainly impressive, and these buildings may well be the aulae recorded in the epitaph Paul 54 e.g. A. Solmi, L'amministrazione finanziaria del Regno italiano nell'alto medio evo (Pavia, 1932), 40. 55 A. Hoffmann, ‘Die Aachener Theoderichstatue*, in V. H. Elbern, ed., Die erste Jahrtausend (Düsseldorf, 1962), i. 322-3. 56 Chron. Sal. 17 and 37 (pp. 22 and 38). For the other evidence: Delogu, 15-16. 57 Paulus Diaconus, Gedichte, 15-18. 58 Belting, 175-93; Delogu, 23; M. Cagiano de Azevedo, ‘Esistono una archi­ tettura e una urbanistica longobarde?*, A tti del Convegno Intemazionale sul Tema: la Civiltà dei Longobardi in Europa. (Roma e Cividale 1971) (Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Rome, 1974), p. 13 (of an offprint).

172

The Necessities o f an Urban Soceity

the Deacon composed for him: ‘You have adorned your country with learning, buildings, and palaces [aulis] ,’59 From the Carolingian period of rule in Italy there is much less evidence of building activity, which is not surprising, since few rulers spent much time there. However, there is evidence of continued maintenance. An Italian capitulary of Pepin, though very garbled, seems to refer to the duty of certain people to restore churches and palaces as a long established public service.60 Five capitularies issued at Pavia by Lothar and Louis II ordered the imperial missi to investi­ gate the problem of the palatia and publicae domus (these latter are probably the lesser curtes regiae of the Lombards) which had been encroached on by private individuals or were in a seriously ruinous state.61 In one of these capitularies the importance of the buildings as show-pieces of power is des­ cribed in terms familiar to us from the Ostrogothic period: ‘so, we command that they be at once repaired and restored to their former state, so that they can be suitable and beauti­ ful for our use and for ambassadors of foreign nations who visit us’.62 Of new building there is very little evidence. Several palaces, particularly in the countryside, are mentioned for the first time in the Carolingian period, but it is probable that at least most of these existed earlier, though unre­ corded.63 The Carolingians probably introduced a new type of palace into Italy from Francia that attached to a monastery (the Klosterpfalz), but the first of these to be recorded (at Farfa) appears in the sources only in the late ninth century, and others are not referred to till much later.64 The only reasonably well-documented new palace is that established by St. Peter’s in Rome: this was presum­ ably placed here, and not op the Palatine, as much through papal distrust of their new allies, as through Frankish devotion to the Prince of the Apostles.65 It was used on several occasions in the second half of the ninth century, 59 Paulus Diaconus, Gedichte, 147. 60 Capit. i. 191 cl. 1 (782/6). 61 Ibid. ii. 64 cl. 7 (832), 87 cl. 6 and 7 (850), 85 cl. 7 (850), 94 cl. 4 (865). For the identification of the publicae dom us: Brühl, ‘Königs’, 407-8. 62 Capit. ii. 87 cl. 7. 63 Brühl, Fodrum , i. 397 and 413-14. 64 Id. ‘Königs’, 408-11. 65 Id. ‘Kaiserpfalz’, 3 -9 .

Palaces

173

and at this date was attributed (perhaps reliably) to Charle­ magne. At Ravenna, however, Charlemagne’s efforts were destruc­ tive. We know from a letter of Pope Hadrian I of c. 787 and from Einhard that Charlemagne removed from this town marbles and mosaics for the building of Aachen.66 The letter of Hadrian specified that the materials were from the city’s palace: ‘mosaic and marble from the palace at Ravenna’. It is very likely that amongst the parts of the palace demolished at this time was the great entrance-complex with the eques­ trian mosaic of Theodoric. Agnellus, writing in the first half of the ninth century, was able to describe this mosaic, but he described it entirely in the past tense: ‘there was \ f u i t ] a figure of Theodoric . . .’. Clearly it had recently disappeared, probably broken up so that its tesserae could be reused at Aachen.67 II

Alongside the imperial and royal palaces, there were in most towns of Italy also the public palaces of the local governors: the provincial governors of late Roman times, the counts of the cities of the Goths, the dukes and gastalds of the Lombbards, and, finally, the counts of the Carolingians. Of these palaces, unfortunately, we know very little. In late Roman times such residences (the praetoria) are occasion­ ally mentioned with other public buildings in laws ordering governors to maintain structures in good repair.68 Specific Italian evidence is, however, rare. A governor of Samnium of 352/75 is recorded in inscriptions to have built in his province a. tribunal at Saepinum and a secretarium at Iuvanum; the exact meaning of both words is not entirely clear, but both probably were judgement-halls.69 In Rome 66 p. 205 n. 7 and p. 218 n. 40 below. 67 This suggests no great devotion by Charlemagne for Theodoric (a notorious heretic). Probably the equestrian bronze statue of the Ostrogothic king was taken to Aachen not because it represented Theodoric, but only because it was a suitable late antique piece. 68 C. T h .i. 1 6 .1 2 (3 6 9 ) and xv. 1. 35 (396). 69 Saepinum (completed by a successor): CIL ix. 2448 = IL S 5524; Ann. Ep. (1930), no. 120. Iuvanum: CIL ix. 2957 = IL S 5521.

174

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

in 408/23 a praefectus urbi restored the seat of the Praefec­ tura urbana.70 After late antiquity the evidence is even scantier. In the Lombard period, indeed, only one curs ducis (at Brescia) is documented, though many more certainly existed, and these begin to appear in the ninth-century sources.71 There are, unfortunately, no early records of the appearance of these buildings and no records to prove building activity. We can only surmise that many or most were probably in origin Roman, and that many are likely to have been added to or altered by their later occupiers. Only in the late ninth century do we find any information as to the appearance of these buildings, for in this period it began to be the practice to state in records of judgements, where in a building these had been held. Thus in Lucca in 853 we hear of a ground-floor hall, ‘sala illa terrestile’, and in 873 and 884 of a heated room, a ‘caminata’.72 These records suggest imposing buildings, but do not help us date the structures. in

The greatest episcopal palace in Italy, and also the bestdocumented, was the papal palace (patriarchium ) at the Lateran; I shall consider it in this section of the chapter, though it would equally well merit a place with the residences of independent secular rulers in section I . 73 Until the time of Constantine, the Lateran was an imperial residence, and the original Roman buildings probably served as the palace’s core throughout the Middle Ages. Before the mid eighth century there are no records of the palace’s appearance, except for 70 CIL vi. 31959 = 37114 = IL S 5523; CIL vi. 31419 with Ann. Ep. (1941), no. 62. For the date: Chastagnol, Fastes, 289-90. For the place: Platner-Ashby, 432. 11 Brescia: Brühl, CDL iii.l, no. 33 (760). Others. Brühl, Fodrum, i. 365-8 nn. 66-8 and 73-4. 72 C. Manaresi, ed., I Placiti del ‘Regnum Italiae’, i (Rome, 1955), nos. 57, 73, and 94 (= Fonti per la Storia d ’Italia, pubblicate dall’Istituto Storico Italiano, 92). In 905 Louis III stayed with the Marquis Adelbert of Tuscany at Lucca, and was roused to jealousy by the splendour of Adelbert’s court: Ldutprand, Antapodosis ii. 39. The ducal palace itself may well have been one of the things that impressed Louis. 73 On the Lateran in general: P. Lauer, Le Palais du Latran (Paris, 1911).

Palaces

175

mention of a bath used in 664 by the emperor Constans II when entertained at the Lateran.74 But from then on an impressive number of restorations and additions are listed in the Liber Pontificalis, which I have set out in Appendix 4. Pope Zacharias (741-52) built a triclinium (ceremonial banqueting-hall), and a new portico and entrance-tower with bronze gates, as well as restoring older parts of the palace. The bronze gates and tower were almost certainly erected in imitation of the Chalke entrance to the imperial palace of Constantinople.75 Hadrian I (772-95) added another tower, and also restored older buildings in particular the portico leading to the baths. Leo III (795-816) restored and decorated a macrona (apparently a two-storeyed portico), and built two new triclinia. One of these, equipped with couches for dining, stood until 1589 and contained the famous mosaics of Christ with Silvester and Constantine, and St. Peter with Leo and Charlemagne.767 The other was an even more massive hall, 68 m long and described as ‘larger than all other triclinia'’P1 Gregory IV (827-44) added new apartments and yet another triclinium, and was also credited with extensive restorations. Leo IV (847-55) restored the dining-hall of Leo III, which was apparently so ruinous that it had already fallen into disuse. Finally, Nicholas I (858-67) added new apartments and a chapel dedicated to the Virgin. The accounts of all these additions and restorations mention the lavish decorative use of marble, mosaic, fresco, glass, and bronze-work. Most of this building work was concentrated on the more public rooms of the palace, and here the main aim must have been the provision of splendid settings to enhance papal prestige. A few hints of this attitude can be found in the surviving evidence. The Liber Pontificalis expresses Hadrian I’s motives in these terms: ‘ . . . for his great love of the honour of Peter, prince of the Apostles, and for the decoration of that holy place, he built and constructed there a new tower . . .’, and, as I have already mentioned, Leo III decorated the arch in front of the apse of one of his triclinia with very explicit 74 Lib. Pont. i. 343. 75 For this and possible similar inspiration for the papal triclinia: Krautheimer, R om e, 120-2. 74 Ibid. 120-1 and figs. 88-90. 77 Ibid. 121-2.

176

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

mosaics to express his ideal of papal and imperial co-operation. In the Donation of Constantine a rather different line is taken. Here the Lateran is firmly and provocatively described as the palace ‘which surpasses and takes precedence over all other palaces in the world’.78 The Lateran was certainly where most papal pretensions and effort were concentrated; however, other papal residences were also built. While the Lateran was held by a rival papal candidate, Pope Symmachus (498-514) built two episcopal palaces {episcopia) at St. Peter’s; the dining-rooms {accubita), which Gregory III (731-41) found in ruins and restored, may have been a part of these buildings. Three centuries after Symmachus, Leo III (795-816) built a large and splendid triclinium there: ‘a larger triclinium, marvellously decorated and with a mosaic apse’. Gregory IV (827-44) added here a small but beautifully decorated apartment for the rest and repose of the popes and their clerics.79 Earlier, John VII (705-7), the son of Plato the curator of the imperial palace, built an episcopium, where he later died, which is described as above (‘super’) the church of S. Maria Antiqua.80 S. Maria stands at the foot of the Palatine, and it may be that John’s was a tentative move by the papacy to occupy the traditional seat of imperial rule; if so, it was an experiment not repeated by his successors. Nicholas I (855-67), for reasons unknown, favoured the site of S. Maria in Cosmedin and built here a papal residence, with a chapel dedicated to St. Nicholas, a triclinium, and heated rooms (icaminatae).81 Outside Rome there is far less evidence. For most towns we find record of the existence of bishops’ palaces {episcopia or domus episcopi) only when the charter-material begins to survive, and an idea of their appearance only where there are surviving records of judgements held in them from the ninth century and later. At Lucca, the bishop’s palace is first re­ corded in 700, but not until 904, when a laubia is mentioned, do we find any detail about this building.82 78 H. Fuhrmann, ed., Das Constitutum Constantini (Hannover, 1968), 87, lines 219-20 (= Monumenta Germaniae Historica, in usum scholarum, x). 79 Symmachus: Lib. P o n t i. 262. Gregory III: Lib. Pont. i. 420. Leo III: Lib. Pont. ii. 8. Gregory IV: Lib. Pont. ii. 81. 80 Lib. Pont. i. 385. 81 Ibid. ii. 154 and 161. 82 Schiaparelli, CDL i, no. 12; Manaresi, ed. cit. (p. 174 n. 72 above), i. no. 116.

Palaces

111

Fortunately, for a few towns rather more is recorded. In Milan, a bishop’s palace is first mentioned in the time of Ambrose, and its splendours in the early sixth century (and a possible restoration) are described in some verses by Ennodius.83 In and around Ravenna we know of Arian episcopal palaces in Ostrogothic times and of an orthodox palace frequently added to.84 In the mid fifth century Bishop Neon built a splen­ did banqüeting-hall, the Quinque Accubita. In the early sixth century Bishop Peter II (494-519) added the archiépiscopal chapel and began a new part of the palace known as the Tricoli, which was only completed by Maximian (545-54). Bishop Victor (537-44) rebuilt on a large scale, and with more splendour than before, the clerical bath adjoining the palace. A century and a half later, Bishop Felix (708-24) built not only another wing, the Domus Felicis, but also rebuilt the episcopal Salutatorium (audience-hall).85 All these buildings were maintained throughout the early Middle Ages so that Agnellus was able to describe in detail their inscriptions, decor­ ation, and functions; indeed, the chapel still survives today. In Naples, in the mid fifth century, Bishop Vincentius added an ornate dining-hall {accubitum) to the episcopal palace there. This too was still standing to be mentioned in the ninth-century Gesta Episcoporum. 86 At Pavia nothing certain is known of the late antique episcopal palace, though tiles, stamped with the name of Bishop Crispin, of the first half of the sixth century may possibly be connected with it; but the epitaph of Bishop Damian {ob. 711) records amongst his achievements a substantial rebuilding of his palace and of its bath: ‘Those buildings that he constructed from their foundations to their gables testify: the episcopal palace [domus episcopia] and the steam baths.’87 83 Ennodius, 122 no. 99 ‘Versus in Domo Mediolani scripti’ are the most usefui; 123 no. 101 may refer to a restoration of this building by Bishop Laurence; 315-16 no. 453 perhaps refers to the episcopal palace and chapel. 84 Arians: Agnellus, RR.II.SS. 217 and 187-8. For the orthodox palace in general: Deichmann, Kommentar, i. 193-208. 85 Neon: Agnellus, RR.II.SS. 78-80. Chapel: Agnellus, RR.II.SS. 149-50. Tricoli: Agnellus, R R.II.SS. 193. Bath: see Chapter 7, section III. Felix: Agnellus, MGH, 374. 86 Gesta Ep. Neap. 412. 87 Crispin: Panazza, nos. 7-8. Damian: Panazzâ, no. 61.

178

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

Although the evidence for episcopal palaces is limited to only a few towns of the peninsula, it is, I think, sufficient to suggest considerable continuity, backed up by maintenance, additions, and major rebuilding.

9

Streets, Bridges, and City Walls In Chapter 8 1 dealt with the public palaces, the residences and centres of power of an urban-based secular and ecclesiastical administration. In this chapter I shall consider those public buildings which were essential not only to this administration, but also to the smooth operation and security of the whole of urban society. I hope thereby to show that, although at the level of munificence and charity we have seen radical change, at the level of basic urban amenities we see consider­ able continuity. I

It requires only a glance at plans or air-photographs of the present cities of northern and central Italy to see continuity in the maintenance of public streets. With some exceptions (notably the pre-Roman hill top towns of central Italy, and Rome itself), the towns in our area were provided in the Roman period with a distinctive regular grid-plan, and in most cases this is still clearly recognizable in the plan of the modem streets. Almost perfect survival is to be found at Pavia (Ticinum), Verona, Piacenza (Placentia), and Lucca (Luca). Less perfect examples are common: Aosta (Augusta Praetoria), Turin (Augusta Taurinorum), Novara (Novaria), Como (Comum), Brescia (Brixia), Parma, Cremona, Bologna (Bononia), Imola (Forum Cornelii), Ravenna, Rimini (Ariminum), Pesaro (Pisaurum), Osimo (Auximum), Albenga (Albingaunum), Genoa (Genua), Pisa, Florence (Florentia), Spoleto (Spoletium), and Naples (Neapolis) (see Fig. 3).1 At present it seems that in only a very few places has a Roman 1 For these and other, less good, examples see the text, figures, plates, and further references in Ward-Perkins, Sommella and Giuliani, Mansuelli, Castagnoli.

180

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

grid-pattern that once existed been totally annihilated by later housing.2 Such a remarkable degree of survival of the Roman streetplans must indicate two things. First, and most obviously, it shows considerable continuity of urban life in those towns which have survived, for, without this, almost the whole pattern of the streets would undoubtedly disappear under rubble and gardens never to reappear.3 This is what happened in England, a country with poor urban continuity, where the only Roman streets to survive in later medieval and presentday plans are those directly linking city gates. Because the city walls and gates were likely to survive even total abandon­ ment, these particular streets would later be revived on the same lines as before, even if the town-site was wholly deserted for a considerable time; but the rest of the Roman streetpattern could, and did, disappear without trace.4 In Italy the situation was very different.5 Secondly, this survival must indicate a degree of continuous public control over the streets, to preserve them from en­ croachment by private building. Without this, it is impossible to imagine how towns like Lucca and Pavia should so accur­ ately have preserved their original plan. In fact, although no laws or edicts survive between the classical period and the later Middle Ages, there is some evidence for continuous legal protection of this kind.6 From the appearance of the very * A possible case is Padova (Patavium): V. Galliazzo, I p o n ti di Padova romana (Padua, 1971), 162-200. 3 Some towns, of course, disappeared entirely. But a recent estimate is that two-thirds of the Augustan towns of Italy survived the troubled times of late antiquity and the early Middle Ages: G. Schmiedt, ‘Città scomparse e città di nuova formazione in Italia in relazione al sistema di comunicazione’, Settimane di Studio del Centro Italiano di Studi sull’A lto Medioevo (Spoleto), 21 (1973), 505. 4 M. Biddle, ‘Winchester: the Development of an Early Capital’, in H. Jankuhn et al., eds., Vor-und Frühformen der europäischen Stadt im Mittelalter (Göttingen, 1973), i. 248-50; M. Biddle and D. Hill, ‘Late Saxon Planned Towns’, Antiquaries Journal, 51 (1971), 81. 5 This does not, of course, prove that the towns were continuously densely settled; cases like present-day Aosta show that a town-plan can be preserved even in a town with large areas of open space: P.-A. Février, ‘Permanence et heritages de l ’Antiquité dans la topographie des villes de l ’Occident durant le haut moyen âge’, Settimane di Studio del Centro Italiano di Studi sull’A lto Medioevo (Spoleto), 21 (1973), 101. 6 Classical period: see pp. 184-5 n. 19 below. Later statutes: e.g. Sommella and Giuliani, 91, for Lucca.

Streets, Bridges, and City Walls

181

earliest surviving Lombard charters, in the first years of the eighth century, and throughout our period, rural roads and urban streets {viae) are often mentioned when describing the boundaries of property, and they are almost invariably defined as publicae, which suggests a precise legal status. From the late ninth century onwards there are charters that include grants of private roads, classi, opening off a public street; the private nature of these roads is carefully stated in contrast with the viae publicae: ‘along with the stretch of road or entrance off the public road, that is its classus \ 7 In 918 Berengar I issued a charter in favour of a deacon of Pavia, Rotger. He had petitioned Berengar for permission to build a house that would extend over the street, thus creating a porticoed pavement of a type familiar today from later examples in northern Italy, including Pavia itself. There is no doubt that Rotger had to receive imperial permission before building, because his plan involved covering part of the via publica and the placing of pillars inside its width, and the grant he obtained carefully specified that his building should in no way obstruct the street: Agreeing to his humble request, with this imperial document we hereby grant in perpetuity to the above-mentioned deacon Rotger, the permission and right to build and construct above that public street . . . within the city of Pavia . . . whatever building he wishes for his own use, and to fix pillars in that road with a wall and vaulted arch under that building [ e t p ila s f i g e n d u m e t m u r u m a t q u e a r c u m v o l u t u m s u b tu s h id e m h e d if ic iu m in e a d e m via f a c i e n d u m ] , on condition, however, that public passage is in no way obstructed .8

In view of the widespread survival of streets following the Roman grid-plans, and of the use of the term via publica from as far back as charters survive, there is no reason to suppose that such a tight control of the streets as is suggested by Berengar’s grant to Rotger was a tenth-century innovation or a phenomenon restricted to the capital, Pavia. Public 7 Bars. no. 1259 (AD 939), see Belli Barsali, 499-502. 8 L. S c h i a p a r e U i , e d . , di Berengario I (Rome, 1903), no. 119 (= Fonti per la Storia d'Italia, pubblicate dall'Istituto Storico Italiano, 35). I have followed Bullough's interpretation of this charter, which is, I am sure, correct: Bullough, ‘Pavia’, 108.

182

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

control to prevent encroachment on to streets must have been continuous and widespread. It is also possible that repair of urban streets, as well as of major cross-country roads, was a continuously enforced public duty. Repair of roads {reparationes itinerum ) is frequently referred to as a service in late antiquity (see below), and a capitulary of Pepin of 782/6 talks of a general burden of ‘restoration of roads’ {stratas restaurandum) as an ‘ancient custom’ {antiqua consuetudo), while one of Charlemagne or Louis the Pious specifically refers to urban streets when out­ lining the duty of each Italian town to maintain its drains and roads {plateae).9 Alongside the evidence for the survival of the street-patterns should be placed that for the survival of open market-squares on the sites of the Roman fora. Though it is impossible to prove, the open squares of the fora of Italy in classical times probably never lost their original and essential function as market-squares, though under the Republic and early Empire they also served as the focus for increasingly splendid religious, administrative, and purely decorative buildings. Assuming this and the degree of urban continuity that is suggested by the survival of street-patterns, one might expect the forumsquares of Italy to survive in late antiquity and the early Middle Ages as market-squares, though stripped of their finery by the decline of the traditional secular monumental buildings around them. There is a certain amount of evidence that this was indeed the case, at least in some towns. The site of the Roman forum is known with certainty at Florence (Florentia), Brescia (Brixia), Rimini (Ariminum), Verona, and Spoleto (Spoletium), and in all five cases an open square remains that is known to have been the site of a later medieval market, which in some cases still flourishes today.10 In the cases of Florence, Brescia, Rimini, and Spoleto no early medieval evidence has survived, but for Verona we have a description of the Roman forum, written around 800, which suggests 9 Capit, i. 192 cl. 4 and ii. 216 no. 3. 10 Florence: G. Maetzke, Florentia (Rome, 1941), 27-9 and fig. 1. Brescia: Storia di Brescia, i. 240-53. Rimini: G. A. Mansuelli, Arim inum (Rome, 1941), 62-7. Verona: Marconi, Verona, 33-40. Spoleto: C. Pietrangeli, Spoletium (Rome, 1939), 39-41.

Streets, Bridges, and City Walls

183

that the site was still clearly recognizable and apparently still marked by its paving and monumental arches: ‘A broad, spacious forum paved with stone, where in each of the four comers stands a large arch’.11 At Genoa (Genua) and Osimo (Auximum) there are also open squares, which served for later medieval markets, on the possible sites of the Roman fora, but as yet the position of these latter have not been proved by excavation.12 At Lucca the Roman forum was probably on the site of the large square around the church of S. Michele ‘in Foro’, though again this has yet to be proved.13 Assuming this to be the case, there has been enough continuity and control to preserve a large open square on the site until the present day, though unfortunately there is no evidence in the many charters of early medieval Lucca to show whether the town’s market in this period was sited here or elsewhere. At Milan (Medi­ olanum) there is a reference in 879 to the forum publicum, probably a functioning market, ‘not far from the mint [moneta]'. Later medieval documents fix the mint as very near the present Piazza S. Sepolcro, almost certainly the site of the Roman forum.14 At Pavia in 901 the abbey of Nonantula leased to the merchant Laudepert a statio (apparently a shop) on the forum clusum (enclosed forum) of the town. The shop had in front of it a mensola (presumably a display stall), and was flanked by two other shops.15 As Bullough has pointed out, there is evidence that this market, or area of shops, may have been on the site of the later medieval and present-day market, Piazza della Vittoria, in the centre of Pavia. This is also a possible site for the Roman forum, although, unfortunately, destruction of the subsoil under the whole square in the late 1950s in order to build an under­ ground market revealed no conclusive evidence of the function 11 Versus, Verona lines 10-11. 11 Genoa: N. Lamboglia, La Liguria antica, (Genova, 1941), 267 (= Storia di Genova, i). Osimo: G. V. Gentili, A uxim um (Rome, 1955), 67-71. 13 Somme Ila and Giuliani, 100-4. 14 G. Porro Lambertenghi, ed., Codex Diplomaticus Langobardiae (Turin, 1873), cols. 492-3 no. 290 (= Monumenta Historiae Patriae, xiii). For the Roman forum: Storia di Milano, i. 517-18: A. Calderini, La zona di Piazza S. Sepolcro (Milan, 1940), 13 and 51-6 (= Forma Urbis Mediolanensis, 4). ls G. Porro Lambertenghi, ed. cit. (preceding note), cols. 658-9 no. 393. Witnessed by five negotiatores.

184

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

of the area in Roman times.16 The compiler of the Einsiedeln Sylloge visited Pavia in c. 800 and copied a classical dedicatory inscription which he noted as ‘in Pavia’s forum’; this suggests that at least at that date, as at Verona, something of the Roman forum still survived.17 In one unique case we even have evidence that a forumsquare was tidied up at a very late date. An inscription on a column at Terracina, reused in the later Middle Ages in the portico in front of the cathedral, records: ‘This forum was cleaned up [mundificatus] in the time of George consul and d u x .,ls This refers to the tidying up of Terracina’s forum (which may well have been the square in front of the cathe­ dral) at some date in the seventh or eighth century. Taken separately, none of this evidence is particularly im­ pressive, but taken together it does suggest continuity in some towns from the Roman forum to the early and later medieval market. Certainly, too, there is no evidence from an early date of markets having moved to new medieval settings. Although continuity seems to have been remarkable (cer­ tainly in the case of streets, and perhaps also in the case of fora), there was also some change. No town has preserved completely intact its grid-pattern of streets, and in many cases this has been knocked seriously out of shape by private encroachment. Similarly, those few Roman fora whose extent we know all now survive as much smaller squares. A certain amount of encroachment on to public streets and squares, and the gradual divergence of streets from the strictly ortho­ gonal, probably began early, and must have continued throughout the medieval and modern periods.19 16 Bullough, ‘Pavia’, p. 97 n. 56 and pp. 110-11. Bullough feels it is unlikely thatthe/orum clusum of the tenth century stood on the site of the Roman forum, but a recent work is more in favour of identifying the Roman forum with Piazza della Vittoria: P. Hudson, Archeologia urbana e programmazione della ricerca: l'esempio di Pavia, (Florence, 1981), 18-20. 17 CIL V. 6431 = De Rossi, Inscr. Christ. ii. 32 no. 81. Other examples of early medieval markets on the sites of fora are given, but with very little supporting evidence, by Mengozzi, 236-8. 18 M.-R. De La Blanchëre, Terracine. Essai d 9histoire locale (Paris, 1883), 173-5 and 122-5 and pi. v (= Bibliothèque des écoles françaises• d'Athènes et de R o m e, 34); A. Guillou, ‘Inscriptions du duché de Rome’, Mélanges de l'école française de R om e. M oyen âge. Temps m odernes, 83 (1971), 149-58. 19 CIL vi. 919 and 31574: inscriptions to mark public land reclaimed from private encroachment on the Forum Boarium of Rome under Tiberius and

Streets, Bridges, and City Walls

185

The main change from the Roman period was, however, in the abandonment of good paving of these streets and squares. Classical Roman streets in Italy were very sophisticated, characterized by huge and durable paving-blocks and raised pavements to protect pedestrians from the mire. Streets of this kind have been found all over Italy, and were apparently usual even as back-streets. The squares of the fora, which were probably normally closed to wheeled traffic, had even finer paving, sometimes in marble. In towns with continuous occupation to the present day, all this paving has been covered to a considerable depth by a gradual build-up of much rougher cobbled surfaces, now sealed under the tarmac. Although they are frequently cut by modern service-trenches, there has as yet been no work to record, let alone date, these later street-surfaces; but the Roman paving-blocks must gradually have been covered from the late antique period onwards, as they became deeply scored by wheel-ruts and as the level of the town rose with successive demolition and rebuilding. The Versus of Milan still refer in c.739 to streets paved in blocks: ‘all its roads are solidly paved with blocks [firme stratum silice] ’, and those of Verona of c.800 to paving in both the forum and the streets (plateae) : ‘A broad, spacious forum paved with stone [stemato lapidibus] . . . the streets are wonderfully paved with cut blocks [stemate de sechs silicibus] ’. These references must be to the remains of the Roman paving, though by the eighth century this is likely to have been in a very bad state, or already largely covered (the Roman paving of Verona’s forum is known to be now under about 4 m of later surfaces).20 The failure to maintain the magnificent Roman paving can be blamed on the decline of civic finance and of competitive private patronage, which I have charted in Chapters 2 and 3. Street-paving was, under the late Republic and early Empire, a common form of building, both by the town administration and by private patrons of all kinds.21 There is no evidence that it was considered an inferior form of patronage. In Chapter 1 Claudius. Bullough, ‘Pavia’, 85-7 for Roman buildings encroaching on the streets of Pavia. For encroachment in the East: Claude, 44-60.

20

Versusy Milan line 17 and Verona lines 10-and 12. Modem depth: Marconi,

Verona, 34.

21 For a selection of inscriptions: Frank, v. 95-6.

186

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

we met a freedman of Assisi who was very proud to have spent 37,000 sesterces on paving. He was indeed building in an illustrious tradition: Caius Caesar, for instance, when con­ sul, paid to pave all the streets of Rimini (Ariminum).22 It was this munificence, helped by the full coffers of the towns themselves, that provided the high-quality paving of Italy’s Roman fora and streets. But only for a while; with the decline of traditional munificence, Italian towns kept their squares and streets, but lost their splendid paving. II

In the classical period Italy was provided with a large number of solid stone-built bridges, and probably many more in wood about which we know very little.23 Many of these bridges were in isolated rural positions, and so fall outside the scope of this work on urban buildings. However, many others were in, or immediately by, towns;not only for the conveni­ ence of the citizens, but also because major bridges, such as that over the Ticino at Pavia and that over the Adige at Verona, were deliberately sited for strategic reasons within a town. From the evidence of inscriptions, it seems that bridges were one area of building very rarely undertaken by private patrons; the only certain privately financed Roman bridge in Italy is the Ponte del Pondel on a small mountain road in the Val d’Aosta.24 The bridges carrying the major roads of the peninsula, such as that at Rimini (Ariminum), seem to have been paid for generally by the State, in imperial times by the emperor. Those on lesser crossings were often financed by the town council.25 In late antiquity there is plenty of evidence of continued maintenance and of occasional major rebuilding by the 22 G. A. MansucWi, Arim inum (Rome, 1941), 62 and tav. xiia. 23 A late antique inscription from Misenum (CIL x. 3344 = IL S 5902) refers to repair of a wooden bridge, and an inscription of 260 records repair to a bridge at Mutina (Modena) destroyed by fire (CIL xi. 826). 24 CIL V. 6899. Gazzola, ii. 98. A bridge on the Flaminia at Pesaro (Gazzola, ii. 74-6) is another possible example;but the recorded (and now lost) fragmentary inscription referring to private financing may well originally have come from another building. 25 Rimini: CIL xi. 367. For a useful collection of bridge-inscriptions: Frank, V. 95-6.

Streets, Bridges, and City Walls

187

emperors and their governors. A bridge on the Via Flaminia at Pesaro (Pisaurum) was restored by the emperors Gratian and Valentinian under the supervision of the local curator rei publicae’, a bridge at Tivoli (Tibur) and its approach-road were repaired by the Roman Senate in 340/50 under the supervision of the praefectus urbi and his son, the governor of Flaminia et Picenum; a wooden bridge at Misenum was re­ built sometime in the fourth or fifth century by a prefect of the fleet and curator rei publicae of the town.26 At Verona a third bridge over the Adige, whose foundations contained a great many marble spolia, may well have been built in late antiquity.27 In Rome itself, Valentinian I and Valens carried out a general repair to the river-bank and bridges, and rebuilt the Pons Aurelius in 365/6. The same emperors with Gratian also rebuilt the Pons Cestius, which was dedicated in 370. In 382 Theodosius began the building of the Pons Theodosii, probably to replace an earlier structure of Probus; in 384 Symmachus when praefectus urbi described some of the problems surrounding this building, and work was still under way in 387.28 Finally, in 565, the governor of Italy, Narses, rebuilt the Pons Salariae, just outside Rome, which had been ‘destroyed down to water-level by the most infamous tyrant Totila’.29 Bridge-work, which is linked with road-repair {reparationes or instructiones itinerum pontium que), features prominently as a public duty in the laws of late antiquity. A law of 370, addressed to the vicar of Italy, ordered that bridges should be restored by local landowners, and a whole series of subse­ quent laws in both East and West repeat the same theme.30 26 Pisaurum: CIL xi. 6328. Tibur: CIL xiv. 3582 = ILS 729; CIL xiv. 3583 (see p. 26;n. 33 above). Misenum: CIL x. 3344 = ILS 5902 (see p. 24 n. 27 above). 27 N o t. Scavi (1893), 3-23; Marconi, Verona, 32. The use of spolia proves a date after c.200; but it is impossible to be more precise. 28 Repair: M. Squarciapino, ‘Albei Tiberis ripas et pontes tredecim . . .’, Archeologia Classica, 25-6 (1973-4), 25Q-61. Pons Aurelius: CIL vi. 31402-12; IL S 769; Amm. Marc, xxvii. 3. 3; Platner-Ashby, 398-9; Matthews, 22. Pons Cestius: CIL vi. 1175-6 = CIL vi. 31250-1; Platner-Ashby, 399-400; Nash, ii. 187-8. Pons Theodosii: Symmachus, Ep. iv. 70 and v. 76; Symmachus, Rei. 25 and 26; Platner-Ashby, 401; Nash, ii. 196-7. 29 CIL vi. 1199 = IL S 832 = Fiebiger-Schmidt, no. 217. 30 C. Th. xi. 10. 2 (370); xi. 16. 15 (382);xi. 16. 18 (390);Leg. Nov. ad Th., Nov. Val. 10 (441); Justinian: Codex, i. 2. 7 (423).

188

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

Bridge- and road-work were considered very important, and some of the laws are careful to specify that even the privileged Church is not to be exempt.31 This public duty almost certainly continued in force throughout the early Middle Ages. In 782/6 an Italian capitu­ lary of Pepin refers to church-, bridge-, and road-work as an ancient duty for which no immunity can be claimed: ‘All must contribute to the restoration of churches, the building of bridges, and the repair of roads, as was the old custom. No immunity and no excuses in this matter are to be proffered.’32 It is just possible that Pepin’s capitulary refers to an old duty, revived after a long laspse; but it seems much more likely that these duties were enforced in Italy continuously from late antique times, and indeed this latter hypothesis is supported by the evidence of a great many Roman bridges surviving in the peninsula (see below). In 832 a capitulary of Lothar referred to ‘Road-, bridge-, and other public duties’, and another of Louis II of 865 to ‘those who must repair palaces, and those who must repair bridges’.33 In 850 a series of three capitularies of Louis II are very specific about the universal application of the duty. In particular, one of them commands that by 1 March the bridge at Pavia should be restored ‘according to the ancient arrangement’, and, from the refer­ ence to ‘each . . . his portion’, it is clear that the work was divided up into sections allotted to different groups. The capitulary goes on to state that the burden of bridge-building and repair was a general one to be borne by the surrounding population, wherever a bridge existed and wherever a new one was needed: In each city and region on a river, where ancient custom has made bridges, we wish these to be repaired at once; and, if there is anywhere a need for a new bridge, we wish this to be built by the common labour o f all those who live nearby »34

Also from the Carolingian period, we have one piece of evidence that suggests strict control to prevent private misuse 31 Leg. Nov. ad Th., Sirm. Const. 11 (411) does exempt the Church. But it is specifically not exempt in Justinian, Codex, i. 2. 7 (423), Leg. Nov. ad Th., Nov. Val. 10 (441). 31 Capit, i. 192 cl. 4. 33 Capit, ii. 65 cl. 13 and 94 cl. 4. 34 Capit, ii. 87-8 cl. 8, 84 cl. 3, and 85 cl. 5.

Streets, Bridges, and City Walls

189

of bridges. In 873 Louis II made a grant to the Veronese church, and amongst other things allowed the bishop of Verona to bring a water-pipe over the public bridge: ‘the bishop of the holy diocese of Verona may, without anyone preventing him, bring a water-pipe over the public bridge and through any site he wishes to his palace’.35 The best evidence that the repairs and control documentable in late antiquity and Carolingian times were continuous and effective comes from the survival of much of the Roman achievement. At Verona and Pavia the imposing bridges over the Adige and the Ticino were, until the last war, both substantially the original Roman structures, though with evidence of considerable later medieval and modern repair. In and around Rome, the Ponte Milvio (Pons Mulvius), Ponte Salaria (Pons Salariae), Ponte S. Angelo (Pons Aelius), Ponte Cestio (Pons Cestius), and Ponte Fabricio (Pons Fabricius) are all still largely unaltered from the Roman period; another bridge, the Ponte Rotto (Pons Aemilius) stood almost intact until the sixteenth century. The Roman bridges by Rimini, Pesaro, and Ascoli Piceno, and several of those around Padova and Foligno also still exist.36 Such survival can only have occurred through constant care and maintenance.37 An obvious point about repair and control in the early Middle Ages is worth making. With the end of imperial rule, bridges did not lose their importance, either locally, or as river-crossings in a wider network of communications, and their continuing importance must have ensured a certain amount of maintenance. The decisive strategic role that could be played by a major bridge, such as that at Pavia, is well illustrated by Procopius’ account of Theudebert’s invasion during the Gothic Wars: As for the Franks, as long as they were in Liguria, they did no harm to the Goths, in order that these might make no attempt to stop them at the crossing o f the Po [in fact the T icino]. Consequently, when they reached the city o f Pavia, where the Romans of old had constructed a 35 Cod. Dip. Ver. i, no. 242. 36 For the bridges outside Rome: Gazzola i and ii. For Rome: Nash,ii. 178-97; Platner-Ashby, 396-401. 37 Compare Gregory of Tours, Hist. Franc, viii. 33 for the unblocking of a cuniculum of the bridge at Paris (either a drain, or, more probably, one of the side arches) shortly before 585.

190

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

bridge over this river, those who were on guard there gave them every assistance and allowed them to cross the Po unmolested. But, on getting control of the bridge, the Franks began to sacrifice the women and children o f the Goths whom they found at hand and to throw their bodies into the river as the first-fruits o f the war.38

Although, on the one hand, we have evidence of control and maintenance of the existing Roman bridges, on the other hand, it is almost certain that the early Middle Ages in Italy was not a great period for the building of new bridges. The only references we have to new bridges are the very general ones in the Carolingian capitularies quoted above. There is no record in Italy of an ambitious project such as Charlemagne’s ill-fated bridge over the Rhine.39 Bridge-building after late antiquity was probably restricted to wooden structures over minor waterways. To a great extent this can be explained by the richness of the Roman heritage, which meant that to maintain adequate communications it was only necessary to keep in repair the numerous existing bridges. However, in a period of prosperity the existing system of river-crossings would probably have been added to and improved, and the apparent failure of the early medieval rulers of Italy to do anything of the kind may well have been due to a shortage of capital. It was possible to maintain the old bridges at little cost, with the help of labour services, but a major new bridge would undoubtedly have required a large capital outlay. This impression of financial stringency is supported by evidence for the collapse of a few bridges during the early Middle Ages, which were not then rebuilt. The evidence is from Rome and Verona. In Rome, at some uncertain period between classical times and the later Middle Ages, at least four bridges either disappeared or lost enough of their structure to make them impassable.40 At Verona, a second Roman stone bridge was broken {fractus) by the tenth century.41 In both cities there 38 Procopius, Gothic War, ii. 25. 7-10 (Loeb edition, voi. iv, pp. 86-7). 39 Einhard, Vita Karoli, ch. 17 and 32 (= M onumenta Germaniae Historica, in usum scholarum, pp. 20 and 36). 40 The Pons Agrippae (Platner-Ashby, 398) and Pons Neronianus (PlatnerAshby, 401; Nash, ii. 193-5) perhaps disappeared very early. The Pons Aurelius (Platner-Ashby, 399) and Pons Theodosii (Platner-Ashby, 401; Nash, ii. 196-7) were each described as ‘fractus’ in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. 41 A diploma of 905 refers to this ‘pons fractus’ (Cod. Dip. Ver. ii, no. 71);

Streets, Bridges, and City Walls

191

were other bridges that could be used, and the loss of subsidi­ ary crossings was not of vital importance; but their disappear­ ance does not point to the early Middle Ages as a great period for public building. Il l

Before dealing with the building, maintenance, and repair of city walls, one important point needs to be noted. This is an area of public building for which there should be a great deal of archaeological evidence, both through detailed analysis of the few surviving standing walls, to date them and detect repairs in them, and through excavation of foundations and city ditches, to find evidence of rebuilding and recutting. However, as yet in Italy, very little meticulous work of this kind has been done, and the contribution of archaeology has been mainly the basic one of detecting the presence of a city wall, but without providing good strati­ graphic evidence for date of building, maintenance, or abandonme nt .42 One thing, however, is clear from the evidence of archaeo­ logy, of inscriptions, and of written sources: the insecurity that began in the third century led to considerable efforts to refortify the towns of late antique Italy. All of these had inherited pre-Roman circuits or had been given walls at the time of their Roman foundation, but in two centuries of imperial peace many had almost certainly been allowed to fall into disrepair, or had even been partly demolished to make way for later buildings.43 In most cases, perhaps, the earlier walls were put back into a serviceable state under the Liutprand of Cremona, Antapodosis, ii. 40, described only one bridge at Verona; and the I cono graphia Rateriana also shows only one (Fig. 4). The Versus de Verona of c. 796/806 refer to ‘pontes lapideos’ in the plural, but could be referring to one that functioned and one that was ‘fractus*. For a third Verona bridge which also disappeared, see p. 187 n. 27 above. 42 Hence it seems to me at the moment very rash indeed to use the evidence of city walls as a sign of the contraction or expansion of a town at any given period in late antiquity or the early Middle Ages, as Ruggini does,pp. 77-9. Not one of the walls used by Ruggini as evidence can at present be dated (and in some cases even their course is highly uncertain). 43 e.g. Rome: Nash, i. 160-2. Ventimiglia (Albintimilium): N. Lambo glia, Ventimiglia romana (Bordighera, 1964).

192

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

late Empire, without very extensive work being necessary.44 But in at least a few cases large-scale restoration was felt to be needed.45 In some cases there was what amounted to almost complete rebuilding: at Verona wholly new walls were built in 265 on a line just in front of the earlier ones, though the older gates were retained, and at Aquileia a similar late antique circuit on a new line seems to have been added.46 The most impressive new building was in a few imperial capitals that had expanded beyond their republican walls, and where vast new circuits were erected to enclose the whole area. The most famous example is Rome itself, provided between the reigns of Aurelian and Honorius with a huge and imposing circuit, about 19 km long, that still largely survives.47 Milan the main imperial residence of fourth-century Italy, was given greatly expanded walls, perhaps under Maximian,and Ravenna, the fifth-century capital, perhaps under Valentinian III.48 In Ostrogothic times, according to the Anonymus Valesianus, Theodoric built new walls around two of his capitals, Verona and Pavia: ‘he built new walls [alios muros civitatis] ’ and *he surrounded the city with new walls [muros alios novos]’. Archaeological research suggests that in both cases Theodoric in fact was only restoring an existing circuit and perhaps making minor additions and alterations.49 In the case 44 e.g. Aosta: P. Barocelli, Augusta Praetoria (Rome, 1948), cols. 85-133 (= Forma Italiae, Regio IX, voi. i). Spoleto: C. Pietrangeli, Spoletium (Rome, 1939), 42-6. Osimo: G. V. Gentili, A uxim um (Rome, 1955), 53-5. Fiesole (with walls of pre-Roman date): M. Lombardi,Faesulae (Rome, 1941), 4 3 -4 . Lucca: Sommella and Giuliani, 19-46. 45 e.g. Rimini: G. A. Mansuelli, Ariminum (Rome, 1941), 54-61. Como (new towers added): A. Calderini et al.y Lombardia romana, i. (Milan, 1938), 318-20. Perhaps Pavia: Bullough, ‘Pavia’, 87-8. Naples: CIL x. 1485; Storia di N apoli, i (Naples, 1967), 416. Albenga: CIL v. 7781; N. Lamboglia, Albenga romana e me dio evale (Bordigli era, 1957). 46 Verona: CIL v. 3329; Marconi, Verona, 11-23. Aquileia: G. Brusin, ‘Le difese della romana Aquileia e la loro cronologia*, in Corolla memoriae Erich Swoboda dedicata (1966), 84-94. 47 Richmond, particularly pp. 241-62. 48 Milan: Storia di Milano, i. 489-95 (for the attribution to Maximian: p. 489 n. 6. However, the ‘moenibus* of Aurelius Victor need not necessarily be city walls: see p, 46 n. 39 above). Ravenna: M. Mazzotti, ‘La cinta muraria di Ravenna romana e bizantina’, Corsi di Cultura sull’A rte ravennate e bizantina, 17 (1970), 285-92. The attribution to Valentinian depends on Agnellus, R R .II.SS. 116, who may have seen an inscription now lost. 49 Anon. Vales.,c. 71 (p. 324). Bullough, ‘Pavia’, 87-9. Simeoni, ‘Verona’, 7-39.

Streets, Bridges, and City Walls

193

of Verona, the work may have been concentrated around the Castrum where the palace stood. The evidence for this is the charge of the Anonymus Valesianus that Theodoric deliber­ ately damaged the catholic church of S. Stefano at Verona as an act of religious persecution.50 S. Stefano stands just outside the line of the Castrum wall, and it is quite possible that it was in fact damaged in the interests of defence, perhaps to dig a new ditch or to provide a clearer line of fire from the ramparts. At Ravenna, the third Ostrogothic Italian capital, as far as we know, Theodoric was content with the existing wall, though Athalaric later ordered the redigging of the ditch.51 At Arles, the capital of Provence, Theodoric is known to have contributed central government funds to the repair of the walls.52 From late antique times we have evidence not only for massive rebuilding and restoration of the kind recorded by the inscriptions, but also for basic maintenance and repair, such as Athalaric carried out at Ravenna and Theodoric at Arles. We also have evidence of repairs and additions in times of emergency. Maximus of Turin in the early fifth century, in a sermon delivered before a barbarian threat, spoke of seeing ‘in the face of this common threat our leaders preparing de­ fence with walls [tuitionem moenibus praeparare] ,’ and Procopius described in detail the emergency work carried out by Belisarius to the walls of Rome.53 These new projects and repairs were in late antiquity carried out by a combination of central government funds, and local funds and local labour contributed as a compulsory public service. Those inscriptions that record the building of walls by late antique emperors and their immediate subordin­ ates, such as those on the walls of Verona (Gallienus), Rome (Honorius), Albenga (Constantius, general of Honorius), and Naples (Valentinian III), certainly record works in which sub­ stantial contributions came from the central administration.54 so Anon. Vales., c. 83 (p. 324). 51 Variae xii. 17. 52 Variae iii. 44. 53 Maximus of Turin, Sermo 85. 2; Procopius, Gothic War, i. 14. 15 (Loeb edition, voi. iii, pp. 146-7); Richmond, 38-40. 54 See p. 192 nn. 45-7 above. The attribution of CIL v. 7781 to this Constan­ tius (later briefly emperor in 421) is perhaps confirmed by a newly discovered fragment of Rutilius Namatianus’ De reditu suo of 417, which, after describing

194

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

This also must have paid for most of the cost of major work around its own capitals, as at Milan, Ravenna, Pavia, and Verona. However, in late antiquity we also find evidence of work carried out by local provincial effort, though the scale of operations apparently never matches that of projects which the central government organized and helped pay for. Such local effort was not entirely new, since in classical times civic funds (and occasionally private munificence) were used to finance walls, as well as central government funds.55 But whereas in classical times the work of building and repair seems to have come from normal civic income or special gifts, in late antiquity it came from forced contributions of money or labour specially levied for the purpose. In 440 even the privileged citizens of Rome were required to repair their own walls: ‘The prefect of the city is to repair the walls, towers, and gates that have become ruinous. No one at all is to be excused the duty of repair to the walls and those other struc­ tures which we have listed.’56 In Ostrogothic times, when the Variae provide detailed information, we hear of the citizens of Catania (Catina) repairing their own walls with blocks fallen off the ruined amphitheatre, and those of Syracuse contribut­ ing to a special levy by the local governor to repair theirs.57 Wall-work in late antiquity was considered a universal burden. Variae i. 28 exhorted all Goths and Romans with suitable stones lying in their fields to give these over for the repair of town walls, and Variae i. 17, iii. 48, and v. 9 ordered the building of three new fortresses {castra) in northern Italy by the local population. One of these letters, Variae i. 17, suggests that the work was divided up into lengths shared out amongst different communities, and that, although compul­ sory, it did carry with it some pay: *. . . receiving their pay, all who live close together are to repair a length of wall by common effort’. a Ligurian town (possibly Albenga), launches into a panegyric of Constantius: M. Ferrari, ‘Frammenti ignoti di Rutilio Namaziano’, Italia medioevale e uman­ istica, 16 (1973), 15-30. 55 See p. 10 n. 26 and p. 11 n. 31 above. An example of classical private fund­ ing is CIL X . 1425 Herculaneum. 56 Leg. N ov. ad Th.f Nov. Val. 5. 3. See also C.Th. xv. 1. 34 and 49. 57 Variae iii. 49 and ix. 14.

Streets, Bridges, and City Walls

195

Wall-work of this kind almost certainly had a continuous history in early medieval Italy. The town for which we have most information is Rome. Here in 708 Pope Sissinius ordered lime to be prepared for the restoration of the walls, and in 715/31 Gregory II began a restoration near S. Lorenzo, but met problems and abandoned the project; however, repair continued under Gregory III (731-41). Later Hadrian I (772-95) and Leo IV (847-55) both carried out major repairs, the latter adding chain-towers on either side of the river to block possible Saracen assaults by water.58 Leo IV also built the only extension to the walls of Rome of the early Middle Ages, the three-kilometre Leonine wall surrounding the Vatican area (the Civitas Leoniana).59 The Liber Pont­ ificalis provides enough detail about the work of Hadrian I and Leo IV to show that they were working mainly with a labour force drawn from Rome and the surrounding area, contributed almost certainly as a compulsory service. Hadrian’s repair is in fact described in terms very close to Variae i. 17 quoted above: mention is made of the various communities assembled, of the division of the work into lengths, and of the provision of a certain amount of pay and food (elsewhere in the Liber Pontificalis it is stated that the wall-repairs of Hadrian cost 100 lb of gold in wages, lime, and other expenses: Through careful effort he assembled the men of all the cities of Tuscia and Campania, as well as those of Rome and its district, and o f all the ecclesiastical estates. He divided the wall into lengths, provided papal funds and food, and thereby renewed and embellished the whole city by restoring its wall.

Hadrian used not only the local population, but also his own estate-workers (tota ecclesiastica patrimonia), and these were again used by Leo IV, who obtained labour for the Leonine wall from the Romans and the inhabitants of the surrounding countryside, and also from two sections of the population more directly dependent on the papacy: the monasteries of the area and the papal estates (the massae publicae or domus cultae). Leo further drafted in teams of captured Saracens, and was helped by a large imperial Frankish donation. But se Sissinius: Lib. Pont. i. 388. Gregory II: Lib. Pont. i. 396. Gregory III -.Lib. Pont, i.4 2 0 . Hadrian I: Lib. Pont. i. 501 and 513. Leo IV: Lib. Pont. ii. 115. S9 See Gibson and Ward-Perkins.

196

The Necessities o f an Urban Society

Leo’s work was a very ambitious project, and required all the labour and money he could lay hands on. The survival of the duty of wall-work is less well docu­ mented outside Rome, and, strangely, it does not, to the best of my knowledge, appear in the Carolingian capitularies which are our main source for church-, palace-, bridge-, and road­ work. However, there is one piece of evidence from Verona Here in 798 the citizens quarrelled with the Church when dividing up the burden of a repair to the city walls ordered by the imperial authorities. From a record of this quarrel prepared in 837, when another imperial order arrived, we learn that in Lombard times (if the information is correct) maintenance to the walls had been paid for by the local duke out of public funds, without having to trouble the citizens, ‘because this was not necessary in Lombard times, when it was looked after by public effort \publico studio]. If any of it ever collapsed, it was at once restored by the governor [vicarius] of the city.’ In Carolingian times, however, in 798 and 837, the citizens were definitely expected to contribute to the work. This might suggest that wall-work had been revived as a duty by the Carolingians ; on the other hand, the Verona document contains no evidence that the citizens felt this duty to be a new hardship. The dispute was not over the burden itself, but over its division. It is therefore possible that wall-work was fully established as a duty even in Lombard times, though for some reason it was not called upon at Verona.60 Certainly it would be strange if wall-work did not have a continuous history, when church-, palace, bridge-, and road-repair seem to have done. The Verona evidence is also interesting because it emphasizes the important point that defensive work remained, in general, strictly under the control of the secular authorities. Rome, where the local bishop took over this responsibility by 708 if not before, is a very important exception to this rule; but it is the exception, until the end of the ninth century, when bishops did start to take over effective political power in many towns of the peninsula, and with it assumed control of the walls.61 60 Cod. Dip. Ver. i, no. 147.