Church Building and 'Caesaropapism', A.D. 312-565 Geanakoplos, Deno J Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies; Summer 1966; 7, 2; ProQuest pg. 167 Church Building and 'Caesaropapism,' A.D. 312-565 Deno John Geanakoplos THE PERIOD from the conversion of Constantine to the death of Justinian is not only that in which the crucial problem of the imperial authority over the church became crystallized; it is also one of the formative eras with regard to monumental church building, perhaps the most formative in the history of the church. Each of these questions separately has been a subject of intensive study, but their correlation has been dealt with only cursorily if at all. It is the purpose of this paper to examine the two considerations in conjunction with each other, with the aim of deriving, in different perspective, new insights into the fundamental problem of the rela­ tionship of church and state in this early period. Of the fifteen emperors of the Byzantine East and the somewhat greater number in the West during the period from A.D. 312 to 565, by far the most important as regards church construction were the first, Constantine the Great, and the last, Justinian. Because of his position as the first Christian Roman emperor it was only naturally Constantine's desire to commemorate, by monumental church build­ ing, the most sacred shrines of Christianity. Justinian, the last of this series of emperors, was as great a builder as Constantine, if not greater. And from the viewpoint of political theory, Justinian ruled in the so-called HCaesaropapistic" tradition earlier established by Con­ stantine. Indeed Justinian, historians generally agree-even those who dislike the term-was the most HCaesaropapistic" of all Byzantine emperors. In his reign there was constantly emphasized, as we see clearly both from his civil and canon law, the concept of the unity of the empire-one church, one state, both under the rule of God's representative or vicegerent on earth, the Basileus. This theory of the imperial rule over the Basileia, the Christian empire on earth, in imitation (p,lJ-l-'YJULs) of God's rule over the divine order in Heaven, was formulated largely by Constantine's adviser Bishop Eusebius, who 167 168 CHURCH BUILDING AND 'CAESAROPAPISM', A.D. 312-565 combined elements drawn from Christian, Hellenistic and Roman concepts and practices.1 Eusebius, however, did not explicitly spell out all aspects of his theory. Indeed, what to our minds seems to be a blurring of the spheres of church and state, as well as Eusebius' impreciseness with respect to the extent of imperial control over the church, was to re­ main a basic problem for all later emperors and patriarchs-not to speak of modern historians. 2 The problem of establishing a correlation between the degree of the emperor's authority over the church, in theory and practice, and the amount and kind of church building accomplished in each reign is obviously a very complex one. It involves not only the technical problem of the architecture of the churches erected but, more im­ portant, the motivations of individual emperors in such construction, and, finally, of course, the possible effect of this construction in bring­ ing the church and the faithful more closely under imperial control. It has been suggested that the literary sources are less than ade­ quate in dealing with this problem and that "archeological evidence offers perhaps the surest access to imperial church building, confirm­ ing or disproving the literary evidence."3 Certainly it would seem clear that for this period, where the monuments are so often dilapi­ dated or even destroyed and where the stones themselves, except through an occasional inscription, cannot speak for the emperor's motivations for building, the architectural evidence must be supple­ mented from other sources. A complete and balanced view of this difficult question must take into account not only the churches them­ selves but speeches and letters of the emperors, civil and canon law, 1 Eus. Laus Constantini [hereafter LausC] (Eusebius Werke ed. I. A. Heikel, I [GCS 7, Leipzig 1902] 199). For the importance of Eusebius in Byzantine political theory see D. Geanakoplos, "Church and State in the Byzantine Empire: A Reconsideration of the Problem of Caesaropapism," Church History 34 (1965) 385. On Eusebius' political thought see esp. N. Baynes, "Eusebius and the Christian Empire," Annuaire de l'Institut de philclogie et d'histoire orientales 2 (1933-34) 13-18; E. Schwartz, Kaiser Constantin und die christliche Kirchel (Leipzig 1936); F. Cranz, "Kingdom and Polity in Eusebius of Caesarea," HThR 45 (1952) 47-66; cf Ph. Sherrard, Greek East and Latin West (London 1959) 92ff. Ian this problem see, most recently, Geanakoplos, op.cit. 385ff with bibl. See also K. M. Setton, Christian Attitude towards the Emperor in the Fourth Century, Especially as Shown in Addresses to the Emperor (New York 1941) 48ff, 79ff. 3 G. T. Armstrong, "Imperial Church Building and Church-State Relations, A.D. 315- 565," paper read at the American SOCiety of Church History, December 1965. The topic of this article was Originally suggested to me by the title of Professor Armstrong's paper, to whom I am also grateful for some bibliographical suggestions. It is hoped that this paper will supplement the study Armstrong is planning to publish. On Eus. Vita Constantini, see below pasSim, esp. n.19. DENO J. GEANAKOPLOS 169 contemporary histories, encomia, all with their doctrinal and ideo­ logical implications and all of course subject to rigorous scrutiny with regard to their reliability. In this paper, which will focus primarily (but not exclusively) on the two most significant builders and ex­ amples of what, rightly or wrongly, is termed Caesaropapism, Constantine and Justinian, I shall try to draw on these various sources. Constantine, in seeking to adjust to the new relationship between the Roman government and the now legally recognized Christian church, established important precedents for subsequent emperors. The reasons for Constantine's conversion to Christianity, are, of course, fundamental for any understanding not only of his policy toward church-state relations but also of his motives in building churches and shrines. Many scholars, Baynes perhaps outstandingly, believe that Constantine was motivated by sincerity, a sincerity how­ ever actuated in large part by his need for securing on his side the support of the right God, a God who could bring him victories over his enemies.4 If we accept this view, as I think we can, we should, by extension, also assume that he would have desired that his chosen God be properly worshipped throughout his empire. The corollary to this theory, that of removing the wrong kind of worship, may be said also to have obtained for Constantine. For, in contrast to his apparent building of only two or three pagan temples (that of Tyche, for ex­ ample, at the time of Constantinople's foundation and one much later in Umbria, dedicated to his family's genius),5 Constantine, as Eusebius points out, constructed a large number of churches with the aim of suppressing pagan worship (at Marme, for instance, in Pales­ tine).6 We know also from Eusebius that Constantine "forbade the , N. Baynes, Constantine the Great and the Christian Church (London 1932) 29. 6 Zosimus, Historia Nova ed. Bekker (CSHistByZ 30, Bonn 1837) 97f, mentions the temple of the Dioskouroi and the Tycheion. Socrates, Ecclesiastical History (Migne, PG 67 [Paris 1864] col. 409), notes that Emperor Julian worshipped the image of Tyche in a building called a fJacr~. For Constantine's temple in Umbria see CIL XU.l 5265. This inscription from Hispellum, dating from the last years of his reign, prohibits the use of the temple for pagan worship. See also A. H. M. Jones, Constantine and the Conversion of Europe (New York 1962) 89, 175. 8 On Marme see Eus. Vita Constantini [hereafter VitaC] (Eusebius Werke ed. Heikel, I [GCS 7, Leipzig 1902] 99-104), where Eusebius tells of the order to build a church building in place of the pagan altar at Marme, and mentions the destruction of temples at Aphaca on Mt Lebanon in Phoenicia and at Aegae in Cilicia. He also reports that a shrine of Aphrodite was removed from the location where the Church of the Holy Sepulcher was built (pp.s9£). 170 CHURCH BUll..DING AND 'CAESAROPAPISM', A.D. 312-565 immoral customs" (temple prostitution) at Heliopolis in Phoenicia, erecting a church there for which he provided a full staff of clergy.7 Later in his reign, as attested by an edict of Constantius preserved in the Theodosian Code, Constantine forbade pagan divination under certain conditions.8 And it is recorded that occasionally when he needed funds, he would despoil a pagan temple, melting down the gold and silver idols9-something there is no record he ever did with respect to the treasures of Christian churches. Why Constantine, despite his marked partisanship for Christianity, retained the pagan title of Pontifex Maximus, head of the state reli­ gion, is not clear. But his policy toward the pagans, which may per­ haps best be termed one of grudging, even contemptuous toleration, was doubtless based on the realization that the bulk of the Roman population was still pagan. Eusebius' own attitude toward Con­ stantine's continued toleration of paganism might be interpreted as one of anticipation, that as soon as feasible he would entirely pro­ scribe it.1o Regarding right worship within the Christian church, Constantine was less tolerant of heresy than even of paganism. As Eusebius makes plain in his Laus Constantini, Constantine believed that God had appointed him His representative over His earthly kingdom, a fact which, in Constantine's understanding, implied a responsibility to maintain unity in the true faith.H A letter of Constantine, dated 316, to his governor Celsus in Africa regarding the heretical Donatists of that area clearly indicates what he felt his role to be. Here Constantine announces his intention of using his own authority as emperor to settle the controversy on the spot and to teach the Donatist clergy "what worship and what kind of worship is to be given to the Divinity .... Is there anything more consonant with my fixed resolve and my imperial duty that I can do, than to scatter errors, extirpate all 7 VitaC p.l04f. 8 Codex Theodosianus 9.16.1-2 and 16.10.2, ed. T. Mommsen and P. M. Meyer, in Theodosiani libri XVI cum constitutionibus sirmondianis (Berlin 1905) 1.1. 459f and 1.2, 897. Cf. Eus. VitaC pp.59f and 98. 8 Eus. VitaC p.l0lf; see also Eus. LausC p.216. 10 Eus. VitaC p.60f. For Constantine's own views see a letter recorded by Eusebius in VitaC pp.61f, and his edict preserved by Eus. EcclHist (ed. E. Schwartz. Eusebius Kirchen­ geschichte. ed.min. [Leipzig 1908] pp.388-91). 11 Eus. LausC p.llO, indicates that one aspect of the emperor's task was to foster unity in the construction of houses of prayer. Baynes. op.cit. (supra n.4) 12-30, convinCingly argues that the neceSSity of ecdesiastical unity was a determining factor in Constantine's religiOUS policy. • DENO J. GEANAKOPLOS 171 vain opinions and cause men to offer the Almighty a genuine religion, a sincere concord and a worship that is His due?"12 In this and similar directives13 coming not long after the start of his reign we can see the shape of a policy toward the church emerging, a policy which for lack of a better term has been called by modern historians, though not by those of m.ediaeval Byzantium. (who would probably not have understood it), Caesaropapism . Constantine's building program would seem to reflect at least one aspect of his control over the church. We know that he confiscated Donatist churches in Africa 14 and, except at the end of his life, when his sympathies for or against Arianism are not always clear, that he probably did not build churches for the Arians. One exception in his policy should be noted, however, that of 330 when with the greatest reluctance he allowed the Donatists to retain a church which they had seized in Cirta, Africa.1s But it is also significant that he rebuilt another in the same area for the Orthodox.16 There is no doubt that Constantine wanted not only to believe, but to make certain that he had secured the stamp of divine approval for his reign. And along of course with his aim of providing at imperial expense larger structures to hold the growing congregations where proper worship could take place, this seeking of divine sanction was probably an underlying motivation for his building of structures to honor the holy martyrs and to enshrine the holy places connected with the life and passion of Christ.17 The most important churches of Christendom begun or completed by him, especially in Rome, 12 Letter of Constantine to Ce!sus, his Vicar of Africa, in S. Optati Milevitani libri VII, ed. C. Ziwsa, in CSEL 26 (Vienna 1893) pp.211-12 (App. vn). 13 A fine survey of these documents is found in Baynes, op.cit. (supra n.4) 12-17 with notes. Cf Jones, op.cit. (supra n.5) 91-104, who labels Constantine's emerging attitude Caesaro­ papism (p.103). 14 Letter of Augustine to Januarius, in S. Aureli Hipponiensis episcopi epistu!ae, ed. AI. Goldbacher, in CSEL 34 (Vienna 1895) ppA08f. Jones, op.cit. (supra n.5) l04ff, suggests that the order for confiscation was revoked after about three months, early in 321. Eus. VitaG pp.1l2f records part of an edict designed to remove from heretical control every building used as a place of prayer. Neither Donatists nor Arians are mentioned in this context, but Novatians, Valentinians, Marcionites, and Paulianists are named (p.l11). 15 Letter of Constantine to the Bishops of Numidia, in S. Optati Milevitani pp.213-16 (App. x). 16 Ibid. p.215 (App. x). 17 On Constantine's motives for building see Eus. LausC pp.220f, 224, 259, and n.24 below. Eus. VitaC pp.131f also tells of Constantine's order for fifty copies of the Holy Scriptures to meet the needs of the growing number of new converts and the increased number of churches. On Constantine's enlarging of existing churches, see text for n.21 below. 7-G.R.B.S. 172 CHURCH BUILDING AND cCAESAROPAPISM', A.D. 312-565 Constantinople and the Holy Land are well known to historians­ those such as St John's Lateran and St Peter's in Rome; St Irene, the first St Sophia, and at least the foundation of the Church of the Holy Apostles, all in Constantinople; the magnificent churches of Nico­ media and Antioch; and most significant of all for his contemporaries, the churches of the Holy Sepulcher and the Nativity in Palestine. We might at this point make one supplemental observation, that we seem to hear little of Constantine's church building activities in Gaul, Spain, and, aside from Constantinople, in the Balkans.Is In the Vita Constantini, which despite its detractors I think still offers certain important and acceptable material,I9 Eusebius quotes Constantine as saying that he wanted the building of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem, Christianity's most sacred shrine, to be more beautiful than any other building in the empire. Constantine also wrote Macarius, Bishop of Jerusalem, that "a house of prayer worthy of the worship of God should be erected near the Savior's tomb on a scale of rich and royal greatness."20 Besides erecting new churches, Constantine, as we have heard, restored or enlarged older ones. We might make special mention of a letter sent by Constantine soon after the Council of Nicaea to his governors and bishops explicitly directing "the heightening of the oratories and the enlargement in length and breadth of the churches of God ... " and urging his officials "not to spare the expenditure of money but to draw supplies from the imperial treasury itself."2I 18 The best recent study of Constantine's churches is by L. Voelkl, Die Kirchenstiftungen des Kaisers Konstantin im Lichte des rihnischen Sa1eralrechts (Cologne and Opladen 1964). G. T. Armstrong has announced (see n.3 above) his intention of seeking to establish a more accurate list of Constantinian sanctuaries in an unpublished article entitled "Ciampini Revised or How Many Churches Did Constantine Build?" 18 I accept the view of A. H. M. Jones, who holds the VitaC to be both a reliable source and an authentic work of Eusebius: see his recent "Notes on the Genuineness of the Constantinian Documents in Eusebius's Life of Constantine," JEcclHist 5 (1954) 196-200. See also Baynes, op.cit. (supra n.4) 40-49, who is in essential agreement with Jones, although he holds that the VitaC "never received final revision at its author's hands" (p.49); and G. Downey, "The Builder of the Original Church of the Apostles at Constantinople: A Contribution to the Criticism of the Vita Constantini attributed to Eusebius," DOPapers 6 (1951) 58-72, who holds that certain problematic passages in the Vita are later interpolations in an otherwise reliable and authentic work. Cf. the most radical view of the VitaC by H. Gregoire, "Eusebe n'est pas l'auteur de la Vita Constantini dans sa forme actuelle et Constantin n'est pas converti en 312," Byzantion 13 (1938) 561ff. 10 VitaC pp.91f. On the churches of Constantine in Palestine see J. W. Crowfoot, Early Churches in Palestine (London 1941). 11 For this famous passage see VitaC 60. On the heightening and enlarging of existing church buildings see L. Voelkl, "Die konstantinischen Kirchenbauten nach Eusebius," RACrist 29 (1953) 60-64. DENO J. GEANAKOPLOS 173 Whether or not Constantine was personally responsible for adopt­ ing the basilica type of church-a thorny problem that we shall avoid examining here-several important factors must have entered into the reasoning behind the decision to adopt this type of building: (1) that the basilica form could be better adapted to the growing congre­ gations of Christians than any other existing type of building; and (2) that in the Hellenistic East and pagan Rome the long, rectangular form of building with interior colonnades, called basilica, had for long been a standard type of governmental structure.22 Regarding the first point, we might observe that in paganism, in contrast to Christianity, the worshipper did not enter into the temple, the central area of which was generally small and reserved for the god's statue and officiating priests. It is instructive to note that in the sources of the period one often reads of the people's curiosity to enter into the sanctuary of pagan temples to see just what was in there, "to undress the idols," as Eusebius put it. Many pagans were in fact surprised that the god did nothing to avenge the sacrilege committed in his temple.23 With respect to the second point, it does not have to be pointed out that the term basilica comes from the same root as the word basileus, meaning emperor, the head of the imperial government. After the period of the persecutions when the Christians had only just emerged from the Catacombs, it may not have been illogical then-though some historians such as Voelkl would argue otherwise-for Constan­ tine to seek to exalt Christianity as the preferred religion of the state by adapting for Christian use the semi-official basilica form of build­ ing. Eusebius suggests in several passages of the Laus Constantini that one of Constantine's underlying aims in building churches in Palestine was through such construction to attribute imperial dignity to Christ. The implication is that the ruler of heaven should not have an earthly temple less regal than the emperor, his vicegerent on earth.24 22 The question of the origin of the basilica has produced an abundance of literature, with very varied interpretations. See esp. J. B. Ward Perkins, "Constantine and the Origins of the Christian Basilica," BSR 22 (1954) 69-90, and W. L. MacDonald, Early Christian and Byzantine Architecture (New York 1962) with bib!. See also E. H. Swift, Roman Sources of Christian Art (New York 1951). For a short survey of opinions see W. Lowrie, Art in the Early Churchs (New York 1947) 87-110. 28 VitaC pp.lOl-04 and LausC p.216. The practice of opening the temples for public in­ spection and even displaying the contents was revived in Theodosius 1's day: see Sozomen, Ecclesiastical History ed. J. Bidez (GCS 50, Berlin 1960) pp.319ff. 24 For the use of the term {JaCTLALKa to apply to secular imperial structures before Constantine's conversion, see the survey by Ward Perkins, op.cit. (supra n.22) 69-76 with 174 CHURCH BUll..DING AND 'CAESAROPAPISM', A.D. 312-565 Why did the bishops of Constantine's reign, Nicene and Arian alike, seem to raise no serious objections to the imposition of Constantine's will over the church? Even Athanasius (that is, before the reign of Constantius) made no real protest, his differences with Constantine apparently being based rather on the emperor's seemingly concilia­ tory attitude toward Arianism, that is toward false dogma.25 Athanasius in fact wanted Constantine to use to the full his imperial authority in order to suppress Arianism. The bishops' acceptance of, or apparent concurrence in, Constantine's authority over the church, was probably based on the bishops' need of state support at this crudal period of the church's development, on their gratitude for Constantine's elevation of Christianity to at least the level of the other religions, as well as on the bishops' appreciation of the many favors the emperor had lavished upon them, such as relief from curial duties and the grant of extensive properties, not least impressive, of new churches and shrines.26 From the viewpoint of imperial control, however, there was prob­ ably no sharp difference in Constantine's mind between the spheres of church and state. Each was an important aspect of the Basileia on earth over which the emperor ruled as the divinely appointed agent of God. If at times, because of temporary political exigency, Con­ stantine seemed unduly tolerant of the Arians or even of the pagans­ not however of the Donatists-he never really deviated from his underlying conviction of being God's vicegerent on earth. And in his church building program in behalf of the Nicene Orthodox, I think we may see reflected one important side of his concept of steward­ ship, or if you will, Caesaropapistic control over the church. Constan­ tine's aim of achieving church unity is, to be sure, emphasized by notes, and Swift, op.dt. (supra n.22) 9-30. Cf L. Voelkl, op.dt. (supra n.21) 60ff. We mention here terms applied by Eusebius to early church buildings, some already noted, others unemphasized. For example, for usages of JKKAT/ula, WK-n7p,o. V€Ws and €UKT~P'o. otKO' see VitaC pp.98f; for 1TPOUWK-n7P'ov see EcclHist ed. Schwartz p.370; and for the first occurrence of KVp,aKov OlK€£OV see EcclHist ed. Schwartz p.363. The church building in Tyre dedicated about 314 (see Setton, op.dt. [supra n.2] 44) is referred to in Eusebius's panegyric as a {1aalA.€w. olKo. (EcclHist ed. Schwartz p.381). See also n.5 above. Constantine's churches in the Holy Land are characterized by Eusebius as f3aa~,,"£vs at the Council of Chalcedon. 66 See Geanakoplos, op.cit. (supra n.l) 390-92 with bibl. (citing Mitard and Diehl). As Procopius puts it, Aed. ed. Haury/Wirth, IV p.6, Justinian closed all paths leading to error and established religion firmly upon a single foundation of the faith. 68 Evagrius, BeclHist, PG 86.2, cols. 2736-2737. See n.58 below for the churches in that area specifically mentioned by Procopius. DENO J. GEANAKOPLOS 183 tended to supplant Arian with orthodox worship,57 as seems to have been the case with his construction of the churches mentioned in Vandal Africa, for example, at Septum.58 And we have explicit evi­ dence, often overlooked, from John of Ephesus, a Monophysite, that Justinian built 96 churches, 55 of these explicitly with imperial funds, for the use of the converted "Hellenes," that is former pagans, in Western Asia Minor.59 The evidence of these statements would cer­ tainly seem to indicate that Justinian, like Constantine before him, followed a policy of encouraging the construction of churches in order to combat heresy as well as paganism. In the construction of St Sophia in Constantinople, undoubtedly Justinian's greatest building achievement, his architects Anthemius of Tralles and Isidore of Miletus achieved a solution to one of the most difficult engineering problems in architectural history, the erecting of a huge, round, masonry dome over a large square surface. One leading art historian, B. Smith, believes that Justinian may have been impelled to construct St Sophia's magnificent dome less from struc­ tural or aesthetic considerations than from the influence of ideas long current in the Near East-the imagery of the dome as representing heaven, that is as a kind of celestial canopy over the earth, both heaven and earth constituting halves of a great cosmic egg. These ideas are connected with the popular cult of the old pagan heroes, the Greek Dioskouroi, who were considered precursors of the Christian martyrs 57 MacDonald, op.cit. (supra n.22) 32, and Fleming, op.cit. (supra n.31) 147. Cf Bury, op.cit. (supra n.42) 11.284f. 68 Procop. Aed. ed. HauryfWirth, IV p.185. In addition to the church at Septum, modern Ceuta, five churches at Leptis Magna, modern Lebda (p.177), a church at Sabratha, modern Tripoli Vecchia (p.178), and two churches and a monastery at Carthage are mentioned (p.180). A. A. Vasiliev, History of the Byzantine Empire I (Madison 1964) 138f, mentions archaeological evidence of apparently Justinianic churches in Spain and in the Crimea (at Dory). 69 See Bury, op.cit. (supra n.42) II.371. These churches were built in Phrygia, Lydia, and Caria; 55 were paid for by the imperial treasury and 41 were built by the proselytes out of their own funds. Two monasteries were also built. Procopius makes no attempt to list all Justinian's buildings (see Aed. ed. Haury/Wirth, IV pp.38, 186), yet he does name or imply the presence of church building(s) at over seventy different sites. Twelve of the churches or shrines mentioned were dedicated to the 8€OTOKOS" (loc.cit. p.20, et passim). In Constan­ tinople and the adjoining areas he built over twenty new churches, shrines and sanctuaries, and rebuilt or enlarged over half that many. Cf G. Downey, Constantinople in the Days of Justinian (Norman [Okla.) 1960) 100. Procopius' statement (Aed. p.34) that no churches were built anywhere in the empire without imperial sanction should be read in the light of state­ ments in his Historia Arcana (original title, 'Av.£K8oTa) ed. J. Haury and G. Wirth, Procopii Caesarimsis Opera Omnia III (Leipzig 1963) pp.158f, 164, regarding the emperor's many exactions and control over local spending. 184 CHURCH BUILDING AND 'CAESAROPAPISM', A.D. 312-565 and whose cult, it appears, was of deep interest to Justinian.6o Justinian's contemporary, the poet Paul the Silentiary, in his long encomium in honor of the church of St Sophia, seems to draw pre­ cisely on the above imagery when he describes St Sophia's dome as «the great [celestial] helmet, which, rounded in all respects like a sphere, embraces the top of the building [the church] like the radiant heavens."6l Justinian dedicated his cathedral of St Sophia to the Divine Wisdom, the Logos, that is to Christ Himself. (In the De Aedificiis Procopius says explicitly that the Byzantines sometimes called God "Sophia.")62 But it seems certain that Justinian envisioned St Sophia as a symbol of his own imperial authority as well. We know that it was his aim to build the most magnificent church in all Christendom, and for this purpose (he was not the first Christian emperor to do so, by the way)63 he despoiled ancient temples of their treasures. The remark that Byzantine writers report Justinian to have made at the completion of the structure, "Solomon, I have surpassed thee,"64 is particularly significant, because it emphasized Justinian's connection with the most famous Hebrew king-priest and temple builder. Paul the Silentiary, in his descriptive panegyric on St Sophia (written evidently at imperial request), speaks of the day of that church's dedication as 80 E. B. Smith, The Dome: A Study in the History of Ideas (princeton 1950) esp. pp.77ff. Procop. Aed. ed. Haury/Wirth IV p.30, writes that Justinian expressed his gratitude for a miraculous cure received from Saints Cosmas and Damian, the Christian counterparts of Castor and Pollux, by rebuilding and enlarging their shrine at Constantinople. The associa­ tion between the Christian saints and the pagan twins is also suggested by Bury, op.cit. (supra n.42) 1.373. Cf. Swift, op.cit. (supra n.22) 80-84, 107f, who argues that the domes of St Sergius and Bacchus and St Sophia were inspired by domes in Rome which Anthemius of Tralles is supposed to have studied. There seems little doubt that the imagery of the dome suggesting heaven and the analogy between the emperor's authority over the earth with that of God in heaven was important in Justinian's adoption of the dome for St Sophia. See esp. Fleming's statement, n.7l below. 81 Paulus Silentiarius, Descriptio S. Sophiae ed. Bekker (CSHistByz. 32, Bonn 1837) p.25, lines 489-491 : €ypopiV'r} a' N.J.,.Tfip(hv €S a1TA€TOV -lJlpa -m/A7]~ 1T&V708£ p.~v u,pa£P'rJadv J.AlUG€Ta£, 0111. a~ ,pa£apds ovpavds ap.,p£f31{3'T]K€ Mp.ov uKl1ras. Note also lines 529£ (p.27) where the dome is described by the words, Ku.A~P7] I €.nn]A7]~ {3afJ.JKOA7rOS a€lp€Ta£ 'the roof rises like a beautiful high-crowned helmet'. 82 Ed. Haury/Wirth, IV p.8. 83 Constantine had despoiled temples: see above, nn.6 and 23. Justinian despoiled Arian churches, according to Procop. HistArc ed. Haury/Wirth, m pp.nff. 64 Justinian's words are recorded in an anonymous account preserved by Banduri and other editors: see ..1ulY'7G£' 1T€P~ ri/. OlKOaOP.fj. TOU vaou ri/. p,€yaA7]' TOU 8€ou J.KKA'T]Gla. ri/. i7Tovop,a~op,lV'r}' 'Ayla. Eoq,la. §27, ed. T. Preger. Scriptores Originum Constantincpolitanarum 1 (Leipzig 1901) p.l05. DENO J. GEANAKOPLOS 185 one in which "God and the emperor are celebrated together" (6hos 7'£ Kat j3a,atA£VS aqLvVV£7'CXL).65 And, more than once in his De Aedificiis, Procopius, while praising Justinian's personal abilities as a kind of non-professional architect-engineer, attributes his success in solving difficult problems of church construction above all to his partnership (avV~)HX7Tp&aaETa,) with God.66 There is a very striking and effective argument, based on Malalas, regarding the emperor's building crea­ tions, KT{a€ts67 (the same Greek term used, incidentally, as the title of Procopius' Buildings)68 in imitation of Divine creativity-evidence which further emphasizes the parallel we have been drawing between God's power in heaven and his viceroy's activities on earth. In connec­ tion with this imperial ideology it would be useful, also, if it could be determined whether or not the famous passage in Constantine Porphyrogenitus' De Cerimoniis regarding the emperor's double throne obtained as early as the reign of Justinian. According to this tenth century source the emperor's throne was a double one. The emperor usually sat on the right side, which was considered that of Christ. On Sundays and feast days, however, he sat on the left, leaving the right side vacant so as to make it visible to all that he shared (avv{}povos) his throne with Christ.69 In our analysis of the reigns of the emperors from Constantine to Justinian, we may then distinguish three basic interrelated purposes in their policy of constructing churches. Aside from the obvious prac­ tical desire to provide places of worship where none previously existed (as in the newly converted area of Tzanica in eastern Asia Minor under Justinian),70 the imperial building programs seem basically to have been motivated by: (1) a wish to promote the one true faith (as the emperors saw it) to the detriment of paganism and heresy, (2) the ideological aim (aided by what several scholars have termed "imperial propaganda")71 of glorifying the imperial power 65 Paul. Silent. DescrSSophiae ed. Bekker, p.3 line 2. 88 Procop. Aed. ed. HauryfWirth, IV p.55. 67 G. Downey, "Imperial Building Records in Malalas," BZ 38 (1938) 1-11, esp. 10 and n.3. 68 Procop. Aed. (IIEp'!. Knup.a:rwv) ed. Haury/Wirth, IV p.134, concludes his discussion here of all Justinian's buildings (wrlu€L~) in Constantinople, ecclesiastical and secular. 69 Constantine Porphyrogenitus, De Cerimoniis Aulae Byzantinae ed. Reiske (CSHistByZ 9, Bonn 1830) p.521. Also see E. Kantorowicz, Laudes Regiae (Berkeley 1946) 50. 70 Procop. Aed. ed. Haury/Wirth, IV p.92. 71 G. Armstrong (supra n.3) for the term 'propaganda' follows the usage of B. Rubin, Das Zeitalter Iustinians I (Berlin 1960) 139-45. Fleming, (supra n.3l) 171f, suggests that centralized churches like San Vitale and St Sophia with their "sharp hierarchical divisions that set aside a place for men and women, clergy and laity, aristocrat and commoner, 186 CHURCH BUILDING AND 'CAESAROPAPISM', A.D. 312-565 as the representative on earth of the divine power in heaven (as seen most clearly in St Sophia), and (3) (and this is an overlapping psycho­ logical consideration that would not of course normally be docu­ mented in the official sources except in such a work as Procopius' vituperative anti-Justinianic Secret History)72 the emperors' desire to satisfy their own personal egoism and ambition which, in the Weltanschauung of the period, they fused in their own minds with the concept of the emperor as commissioned by God to rule the earth. As Justinian put it, in a typical phrase drawn from his Codex justinianus expressing what might be called this political theology: "We rule, by the authority of God, the empire which has been en­ trusted to us by the majesty of Heaven."73 To conclude: it seems clear that in the case of virtually every emperor we have studied, there existed a definite correlation, ex­ pressed or unexpressed, between the emperor's policy of control (or lack of control) over the church, that is his so-called "Caesaropapism," and his policy with regard to the construction of churches. In general then it may be said that the emperors' building of religious structures constituted an instrument not only for the furthering of imperial control over the church, but, through imperial insistence on ecclesi­ astical unity as reflected in the aims of their building policy, for pro­ moting the ultimate aim of the unity of the empire itself. UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS April,1966 were admirably suited to convey the principle of imperial authority. [Such structures inspired an attitude of reverence] not only to God, but also to His viceroys on earth ... The majesty of God was felt through the infinite power of government ... Both spiritual and secular authority were imposed on man from above [fostering his acceptance of] the unified ideal of one Christian empire with one church, one emperor, and one body of laws." See also n.67 above. 73 His tAre ed. Haury/Wirth. III pp.51. l20f and esp. 162. 73 Codexjustinianus 1.17.1 ed. Krueger, Corpus Iuris Civilis III, p.69. For further analysis of Byzantine church-state ideology see my Byzantine East and Latin West: Two Worlds of Christendom in Middle Ages and Renaissance (Oxford 1966) 33. 86, 96ff; see also G. Mathew, Byzantine Aesthetics (London 1%3) esp. 59-64, 86, 93, which deals peripher­ ally with some of the questions discussed in this article.