Gifts Bearing Greekness: Epistles as Cultural Capital in Fourth-Century Cappadocia

Abstract

The Cappadocian Fathers composed letters for a wide variety of audiences. A large number of their epistles accentuated a heritage they shared with addressees who were proficient in the complex education of Greek παιδεία. This study addresses the bishops' letters through a sociological lens by characterizing the epistles as a form of cultural capital: evidence of an individual's comprehension of the Hellenic values guiding social interaction among elites. By exchanging letters with leaders of similar training in the eastern Roman Empire, the Cappadocians and their correspondents were participating in a trans-historical camaraderie with noble Greeks from the past. Like the heroes of Homeric epics, they were engaging in a form of gift giving that accentuated the virtues of φιλία (friendship) and τιμή (honor). The epistles were manifestations of an accumulated cultural knowledge that informed the policies of rhetoricians and select bishops and officials within the eastern provincial administration. The Cappadocians' conveyance of letters imbued with Greek references and allusions facilitated their acts of civic patronage by transcending potential religious differences with the language of a nostalgic pre-Christian past. Lessons from this venerated antiquity resonated within the fellowship of the learned and reinforced a social and political administration rooted in Hellenic tradition.