Romanitas and the Church of Rome

Abstract

This chapter shows that the Church in Rome was always more than a stranger, and less than a friend, to its pagan hosts. It begins by showing that even Christians who spoke Greek were not reluctant to appropriate the Roman name or the commonplaces of Roman literature. It then argues that the autocratic bishops of the city, while their measures sometimes legalized what was not yet law in Rome, were more intolerant of variety in worship than their rulers, and began to claim monarchical dominion in the Church at the very epoch when the sovereignty of the Empire was divided. It was not the pope but Ambrose of Milan who took the floor in the debate on the Altar of Victory, even though his apology for Christendom included a panegyric on the vigour of ancient Rome.