Cristianización en el siglo IV y la conversión de mujeres

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Christianization in the Fourth Century

The Example of Roman Women

ANNE YARBROUGH

At the beginning of the fourth century the Roman aristocracy was for themost part pagan in its religious attitude1 By the end of that century the aristocracy had undergone what Peter Brown has described as a sea change itspagan values had become redefined within the context of Christianity2 This driftinto respectable Christianity was the result of the process of socialization in thehouseholds of the Roman senatorial class over several generations Brown suggests that the fourth-century Christianization of the aristocracy was the achievement of those upper-class Roman women who by continuing to practice their Chris

tian religion in the households of their pagan husbands established the syncretisticmilieu which would influence the religious attitudes of the next generation Butthe apparent calm of Browns anonymous culture-bearers is disturbed by a smallgroup of women whose religious extremism delineates them sharply from theirpeers Rejecting wholly the society into which they were born they fled thecloying Roman atmosphere for the harsh air of the desert The respectable Christianity that Rome was adopting offered them no satisfaction

This paper will attempt to modify Browns somewhat benign and impressionistic sketch of Christian aristocratic Roman women in the fourth century It

will consider the cluster of ascetic women who stand out in sharp relief againstthat background It will analyze the social bonds that held these women together then it will deal with the relationship between members of the group and theirown immediate families Having treated her immediate environment the paperwill describe a composite ascetic woman by considering the necessary elements ofher asceticism Finally it will consider the effect of the group on its society

For clarity the paper includes two stemmata The first shows the familialrelationships among most of the women who will be discussed8 The second is aspiritual stemma indicating schematically the web of influences among the women

and their relationships to some major figures of the fourth-century church Theyare as follows

1 For Roman aristocratic paganism in the course of the fourth century see AHM JonesThe Social Background of the Struggle between Paganism and Christianity in TheConflict Between Paganism and Chrstfonity in the Fourth Century ed A Momigliano (Oxford Clarendon Press 1963) pp 17-37 H Bloch The Pagan Bevival in theWest at the End of the Fourth Century ibid pp 193-217 JA McGeachy QuintusAurelius Symmachus and the Senatorial Aristocracy of the West (Ph D diss University of Chicago 1942) F Paschoud Boma Aeterna Etudes sur le patriotisme Bomain

dans Voccident Latin a Vepoque des grands invasions (Borne Institut Suisse de Borne1967)

2 PBL Brown Aspects of the Christianization of the Boman Aristocracy Journal of Boman Studies 51 (1961) 4

3 The first stemma is taken from A Chastagnoicirc Le seacutenateur Volusien et la conversiondune famille de laristocratie Bomaine au bas-empire Beacutevue des Etudes Anciennes 58(1956) 249 for the Caeionii from F X Murphy Melania the Elder A Biographical



150 CHURCH HISTORY

STEMMA OF THE CAEIONII FAMILY

C Caeionius Ruf ius Volusianusconsul 311 and 314

Caeionius Ruf ius Albinusconsul 335 and 345

C Caeionius RufiusVolusianus Lampadiuspraefectus populi 355praefectus urbis 365m Caecinia Lolliana

AVbina ght

Marcella

a daughter

Asella Pammachius

IC Rufius

Albinuspraefectus

urbis 389-391m a Christian

ILollianad 371

Publilius CCaecina Albinuspontifex Vestaeconsul of Numidia365m a Christian

CaeioniusVolusianus

Albinam Valerius

Publicoacutela

RufiusAntonius

A Volusianuspraefectus

urbis 417-418praefectus

populi 428-429Caecina Decius

Albinuspraefectus urbis

402

CaeioniusC Gregorius

Valeria Melaniam Valerius Pinianus

Sabina Runtildea

Laetam JuliusToxotius

Paula

PARTIAL STEMMA OF MELANIA THE ELDER

Antonius Marcellinusconsul 341 Pontius Paulinuspraef Gall

Ant Marcellinus m Pontia Paulina

the

Pontius Paulinus of Nola

Melania the Elderm Valerius Maximus

Valerius Publicoacutela m Caeonia Albina

Valeria Melania junior

P A R T I A L S T E M M A O P P A U L A

Rogatus m Blessilla





152 CHURCH HISTORY

Christian asceticism both evoked and answered in its aristocratic converts a sense

of dissatisfaction excitement and a longing for escape There was an uneasiness

in Rome in the late fourth century Though those aristocrats who slid into

Browns respectable Christianity were not noticeably affected by it the un-easiness is reflected in these ascetic women

THE SOCIAL BACKGROUND AND MILIEU OF THE ASCETIC WOMEN

Through their husbands and fathers this group of ascetic women shared a

position in the inner aristocracy of the senatorial order8 Since the reforms of

Diocletian and Constantine the senatorial order had no longer been a rigidly strati-

fied hierarchy solely dependent on hereditary position A nobility of service had

been infused into the nobility of blood The infusion of new men was due to the

power struggle between emperor and senate a struggle which was perceived as a

contest between Christianity and paganism9 By opening up new channels of mo-

bility by introducing into the senate both the achieving members of the lower

social strata and men of good but provincial families the emperor attempted to

mitigate the opposition of a hitherto monolithic institution The nobility of serv-

ice was a vehicle for the Christianization of the senatorial order The inner

aristocracy consisted both of the old nobility of blood and the most successful

members of the nobility of service In either case membership in this most elite

circle could be recognized by the possession of the consulship or of the urban

prefecture10

The number of their relatives who held the offices of consul or urban prefect

indicates that the ascetic women belonged to the families of the inner aristocracy11

The father of Albina the Elder held the consulship both in 335 and in 345 1 2

her

grandfather was consul in 311 and in 3141S

He r nephew the father of Albina the

Younger and the grandfather of Melania the Younger was urban prefect from

389 to 39114

The brother of Albina the Younger was Volusianus who held

among other offices the office of urban prefect from 417 to 41815

Melania the

Elder was the daughter of a consul her grandfathers were consul in 341 and

prefect of Gaul 1 β

her husband was urban prefect from 361 to 36317

8 See AHM Jones The Later Soman Empire (Norman Oklahoma University of Okla-homa Press 1964) 1523983085563 for an analysis of the structure of the senatorial aristocracyHe notes (p 529) that the legal rank of an aristocratic woman depended on the rank ofher husband or father S Mazzarino The End of the Ancient World (New York AlfredKnopf 1966) pp 131983085132 also considers this point

9 M K Hopkins Elite Mobility in the Roman Empire Past and Present 32 (1965)1298308526 complements Jones description of the senatorial order but suggests that socialmobility could be recognized before the reforms of the emperors Aside from imperialmachinations he believes that a second reason for social mobility was the aristocraticethos itself which stressed achievement as well as hereditary status and therefore re-quired that the aristocracy remain open to men of skiil In his Social Mobility in theLater Roman Empire The Evidence of Ausonius Classical Quarterly 11 (1961) 246983085247 he offers an example of his theory

10 Jones Later Boman Empire p 55011 Secondary sources considering their relations soeial positions are Chastagnol pp 241983085253 for the Caeionii Murphy Melania the Elder pp 6198308562 Gibbon Decline andFall of the Boman Empire chap 31 gi es some consideration to the nobilt of Pa las



CHRISTIANIZATION IN THE FOURTH CENTURY 158

It is probable that the membership of these womens families in the inneraristocracy was by virtue of their position in the old nobility of blood rather thanin the new nobility of service At least three of their male relatives were members of Symmachus reactionary pagan circle18 In addition Jerome and Paulinusof Nola described these women in terms of their ancient lineages

19 Such claims of

a long and exalted lineage may have been tenuous but they did reflect a socialreality The members of that nucleus of families which made these claims regarded themselves and were accepted as aristocrats of the bluest blood

20 A sum

mary of familial ties suggests that these women belonged to the elite of the senatorial order through lineage rather than through achievement only But in the attempt to reconstruct their social background certain lacunae appear at crucialpoints and force a slight qualification of this conclusion

The brother of Albina the Elder who was urban prefect in 365 was marriedto a priestess of Isis

21 They had four sons and two daughters none of whom is

known to have been Christian Two of the sonsmdashboth portrayed in MacrobiusSaturnaliamdashmarried Christian women whose names and families are unknownTheir marriages produced respectively Albina the Younger who married the sonof Melania the Elder and whose daughter was Melania the Younger and Laetawho married the son of Paula and whose daughter was Paula the Younger Theidentity of the mothers of Albina the Younger and Laeta is crucial in attemptingto determine the social background of these aristocratic households The fact that

they are unnamed suggests that they were members either of the rising social strataof new men who were frequently Christian or that they were like the motherof Melania the Elder members of the provincial aristocracy The presence of bothgroups in the senatorial order of the late fourth century makes either of these possibilities likely The social background of the ascetic women is not yet completely understood While they were all members of the inner aristocracy it is possible that some of them were also the daughters or granddaughters of marriagesthat were mixed socially as well as religiously

The social environment of Roman aristocratic women in this period has beenmemorably described both by Ammianus Marcellinus

22 and by Jerome especially

in his letter on virginity addressed to Eustochium28 They describe a society ofidle and wealthy women living in a ghetto peopled by children servants andsycophants The frustrated productivity of these aristocratic women sought outlets in what has been described as the competitive salon culture

24 They seem

18 Chastagnol p 24719 Jerome Epistulae (Corpus Soriptorum Eoclesiasticorum Latinorum [hereafter C8EL] edi-

tum Consilio et impenois Academiae Litterarum Caesarae Vindobonensis v 55) Ep 10815-8 describes Paula as Nobilis genere sed multo nobicirclior aanctitate Graccho-rum stirps suboles Scipionus Pauli hegraveres cuius vocabulum trahit Ibid Ep 127 Ne-que vero Marcellam tuam immo meam et ut verius loquar nostrani omniumque sanctorumet proprie Bomanae urbis inclitum decus institutes rhetorum praedicabo ut exponam il

lustrem familiam alti sanguinis decus et stemmata per coacutensules et praefectos practoriodecurrentia Ibid Ep 77 29-15 on Fabiola ordine rhetorum praetermisso tota deconversionis ac paenitentiae incunabulis adsumenda Alius forsitan scholae memor QuintumMaximum Unus qui nobis cunctando restitutit rem et totam Fabriorum gentem pro



154 CHURCH HISTORY

to have filled up their days by constantly vying among themselves for social prestige

[The widows] houses are full of flatterers full of guests The very clergy

whose teaching and authority ought to inspire respect kiss these ladies on the fore

head and then stretch out their handmdashyou would think if you did not know that

they were giving a benedictionmdashto receive the fee for their visit The women

meanwhile seeing that priests need their help are lifted up with pride25 This

feminine society mirrored the complexity of the male senatorial order and its own

complexity appears to have been long-established The mother of the emperor

Elagabalus (218-222) had established a little senate of ladies26 whose purpose

was to determine the proper relations among the women of the Roman aristocracy

The spirit of this unique institution appears to have descended upon the women

of the mid-fourth century The group of ascetic women whom we are considering

must be defined against the background of the competitive salon culture

CONVERSION TO ASCETICISM FAMILIAL OPPOSITION

The present group of ascetic women had more in common than social status Of

those for whom evidence is available it is clear that they came from families

where Christianity was already an influence But in spite of the presence of Chris

tian influence there is a pattern of familial opposition to their conversion to

asceticism Familial opposition sheds some light on the aristocratic family of the

fourth century two of the primary duties of children to their families it seems

were the transmission of familial wealth to the next generation and the continua

tion of the lineage itself Conversions to asceticism were inimical to the fulfillment of these responsibilities At least for these two reasons the typical conver

sion to the ascetic life was accomplished in spite of the strenuous objections of the

family

Among the women of the two earlier generations the question of Christian

influence within the family cannot always be answered It is unknown whether

the mother of Albina the Elder was a Christian or whether there was any Chris

tian in her family It is also unknown whether Paulas parents Rogatus and Bles-

silla were Christians Albinas own daughters did grow up as Christians how

ever and Melania the Elder was the daughter of a Christian mother27 In thethird generation of ascetic women Paulas daughters had grown up as Christians

In the fourth generation Melania the Younger and Paula the Younger were both

the daughters and granddaughters of Christian women Nevertheless opposition

to the proposed conversion occurred in five out of seven instances Albina the

Elder wanted her daughter Marcella to remarry when her first husband died after

only seven months of marriage An old but wealthy and aristocratic man promised

to will her his fortune if she would marry him and her mother Albina was ex

cessively anxious to secure so illustrious a protector for the widowed household28

Marcellas sister Asella though she had been dedicated by her parents tovirginity encountered familial opposition in her determination to pursue that

lif




mother had never been willing that she should wear she concluded her pious

enterprise by consecrating herself forthwith to the Lord She thus showed her

relatives that they need hope to wring no further concessions from one who

by her very dress had condemned the world29

Paula was not only a Christian but herself a convert to asceticism But Jeromes

letter to her on the death of her daughter Blessilla indicates that she had been

opposed to Blessillas conversion to asceticism after the death of her husband

When you were carried fainting out of the funeral procession whispers such as

these were audible in the crowd Is not this what we have often said She weeps

for her daughter killed with fasting She wanted her to marry again that she

might have grandchildren 30 In the same letter Jerome speaks for Blessilla de

scribing her happiness after death He concludes Many other things does she

say which I pass over here she prays also to God for you For me too I feelsure she makes intercession and asks God to pardon my sins in return for the

warnings and advice that I bestowed on her when to assure her salvation I braved

the ill-will of her familylaquo

On the other hand Paula actively supported the ascetic tendencies of her

daughter Eustochium When she sailed for Jerusalem leaving the rest of her

family behind she concentrated herself quietly upon Eustochium alone the part

ner alike of her vows and of her voyage82

He r opposition to conversion seems

to have been similar to Albinas each opposed the conversion of the last re

maining daughter both of whom they had previously married off Marcella was

Albinas only daughter aside from the already dedicated Asella One of Paulas

other three daughters Rogata had died and her daughter Paulina lived chastely

with her Christian husband Aside from the son Toxotius then Blessilla was the

only child who might have conceived the next generation Albinas opposition to

Marcellas conversion was not couched in terms of Marcellas duty to provide

grandchildren but it was based on Albinas view of Marcellas duty to her family

Both of these mothers seem to have realized that at least one daughter should

take upon herself the familial responsibilities that converts to asceticism denied

The decision of Melania the Elder to embrace the ascetic life was made after

the death of her husband and two of her three young children Paulinus of Nolawrote Many were her skirmishes down to the very elements in this warfare

against the vengeful dragon For the whole force of her noble relatives armed

to restrain her attempted to change her proposal and to obstruct her passage33

The conversion of Melania the Elders granddaughter and namesake more than

any other conversion indicates the familial responsibilities which bound the child

to the parent and which were rejected by the ascetic Melania was an only

child though she may have had a brother who died in childhood34 Her father

Valerius Publicoacutela had been the only surviving son of Melania the Elder Her

mother Albina the Younger had had one brother Volusianus who did not marryMelania was therefore the last member of these branches of two aristocratic fami-

29 Jer Ep 24 3 Eng tr in Nieene and Post-Nicene Fathers 2d scr 643



156 CHURCH HISTORY

lies She was anxious to embrace the life of her grandmother85

but her parentsexpected her to produce children to whom the wealth of the family would betransmitted and in whom the lineage would continue

6 After her marriage she

produced first a daughter who was dedicated to God as a virgin at the time ofher birth Subsequently she gave birth to a son on whose shoulders the continuation of the line would presumably fall Both children died in infancy after theirdeaths Melania prevailed upon her husband to live chastely with her They bothbegan to sell all their property so that they might undertake the ascetic life Theiraction met with fierce opposition from Melanias parents who attempted to bringlegal action against the two on the grounds that they were still minors Melaniasbrother-in-law Severus also attempted to block the sale of his brothers portionof family wealth The situation eventually elicited the intervention of Serena wife

of Stilicho and sister of the emperor Honorius The support of Honorious fortheir cause finally discouraged the opposition which had been brewing among theentire Roman aristocracy

8T

The Vita S Melmiae in particular suggests the opposition that the conversion to asceticism could arouse in the aristocracy as a whole The reason for suchopposition could lie in the fact that by dispersing a significant amount of aristocraticwealth Melania irrevocably diminished the wealth of the next aristocratic generation Hopkins points out that the only socially approved means of obtainingwealth were through inheritance dowry and the rewards of government office

88 Since office was usually held for only a few years inheritance and dowry

were the two real possibilities of income The total amount of Roman aristocraticwealth therefore had no way of ever increasing significantly it could be exchangedamong families through marriage but there was no external source of income thatwould make the aristocracy richer It could only become poorer Melanias actionwas a scandal because it threatened the financial basis not only of her own familybut of her entire class

Aside from the inheritance of property the continuation of the family itselfmay have been an issue in the conversioacuten of Melania the Younger as it was inthe conversion of Blessilla In this connection Chastagnol suggests II semble que

les pegraveres de famille ont tenu agrave maintenir la tradition pour leur principal heacuteritieret que faisant la part du feu ils ont abondonneacute leurs autres enfants agrave linfluencede leurs eacutepouses

89

Chastagnols stemma corroborates his conclusion In families where themother was Christian and the father pagan the oldest son seems to have beendesignated the inheritor of family tradition and responsibilities Julius Toxotiusthe only son of Paula and her husband remained a pagan until he was convertedby his Christian wife

40 Laeta herself the daughter of a mixed marriage had

two brothers the older urban prefect in 402 was certainly considered the in

heritor of the pagan tradition He was portrayed as a character in the Saturnalia35 Gerontius does not mention Melania the Elder but PaUadius The LauMao History

tr B T Meyer (London Longmans Green and Co 1965) says that Melania the Elder




along with his father and his uncle Albina the Younger was also the daughterof a mixed marriage Her brother Volusianus remained a pagan up to the timeof his death when he was converted

To push Chastagnols suggestion one step further not only was a male childdesignated as the inheritor of the male pagan aspect of family tradition but it wasconsidered undesirable for more than one daughter to be dedicated to the asceticlife The examples of Blessilla and Melania the Younger indicate that there wasa desire for at least one daughter to marry and have children Chastagnols pattern of male inheritance of the pagan tradition seems to have been mirrored by afemale inheritance of the Christian tradition Paula and Albina the Younger musthave expected that their granddaughters would be Christian The Christian mother then had a reason of her own for wishing to have only one ascetic daughter

THE NATURE OF THE ASCETIC LIFE

The most dramatic form of asceticism and the type most frequently associatedwith the women of fourth-century Rome because of Jeromes descriptions of itwas the flight to the desert But there was a second type of asceticism in fourth-century Rome which was more congruent with the aristocratic tradition of thephilosophic life

Jerome mentions Marcella Asella and Lea as maintaining the ascetic life inRome

41 Marcella and Lea founded religious monasteries in the city where they

gave themselves over to fasting and prayer living simply and charitably Marcella had introduced a new kind of religious life into Rome At that time no greatlady knew anything of the monastic life nor ventured to call herself a nun Thething itself was strange and the name was commonly accounted ignominious anddegrading

42 But Marcella who had learned from Athanasius about the life of

Anthony and about the monasteries founded by Pachomius and of the disciplinelaid down there for virgins and widows took up the monastic life in Rome Herexample was followed by other aristocratic women among whom were Paula andher daughter Eustochium Marcella as the center of what was probably an informal group of practicing ascetics moved her household to a farm near Rome

the country being chosen because of its loneliness43

She lived there with theother women who had joined her company until her death soon after the sack ofRome in 410

The life of retirement away from Rome was a traditional alternative for thearistocracy Peter Brown describes its development in the late fourth century

The tradition of otium had taken on a new lease of life It had become more complex and often far more earnest On their great estates in Sicily the lastpagan senators continued to re-edit manuscripts of the classics Many hadcome to think that this essentially private life might be organized as a community Indeed some of the first monasteries in the West were these laymonasteries of sensitive pagans and Christians44

Augustine looked upon his retirement to Cassiciacum in the autumn of 386 as a



158 CHURCH HISTORY

flight to the desert Like Augustine Marcella adapted a convention of the pagan

aristocratic life to her own Christian use

But it is desert asceticism which comes to mind in connection with Jerome

and his spiritual daughters The Eastern ascetic Ufe was embraced by PaulaEustochium and Paula the Younger by Melania the Elder and by Melania the

Younger Their asceticism was dominated by one concern to preserve a singular

attachment to God In order to achieve this goal they practiced detachment from

the world through physical deprivation poverty of spirit and a life of virginity or

chastity At the same time that they struggled to flee the world they strengthened

their attachment to God by the study of scripture and by their passion for the his-

torical concrete elements of the Christian tradition Like their other achievements

the ascetics scorn for their bodies was dramatic Jerdme describes Paulas practice

of the ascetic life As often too as she was troubled by bodily weakness (broughton by incredible abstinence and by redoubled fastings) she would be heard to

say Ί keep under my body and bring it into subjection lest that by any means

when I have preached to others I myself should be cast983085away 4 5

When Melania

the Elder returned to Italy for a short visit after twenty983085five years in Jerusalem

she was met by her children and grandchildren Their short trip from Naples to

Nola was described by Paulinus She sat on a tiny thin horse worth less than

any ass and they attended her on the journey their trappings emphasizing the

extraordinary contrast Be sure that there is such divine strength in that

weak woman that she finds refreshment in fasting repose in prayer bread in the

Word clothing in rags 46

Physical poverty was akin to poverty of the spirit since both were seen as

means of preserving detachment from the world In his letter on the life of Paula

Jerome describes her great humility

Humility is the first of Christian graces and hers was so pronounced that one

who had never seen her and who on account of her celebrity had desired to

see her would have believed that he saw not her but the lowest of maids When

she was surrounded by companies of virgins she was always the least remark-

able in dress in speech in gesture and in gait47

Subjection of the body and of the spirit were both important elements in the con-cept of chastity The preservation of chasity more than anything else was con-

sidered by Jerome as the essence of worldly detachment His letter to Eustochium

on virginity compares the life of the virgin to the life of the married woman

The unmarried woman cares for the things of the Lord that she may be holy

both in the body and in spirit but she that is married cares for the things of the

world how she may please her husband48

The condition of virginity influences

every aspect of a womans behavior she is modest in all things she rejects the

society of married women and avoids any situation that might compromise her

status40

Through physical and spiritual poverty and through the life of chastity theascetic woman sought to put aside worldly concerns so that she might concentrate

ll h tt ti G d Th f J i l ht G d th h




Jerome describes how Paula and Eustochium read the Old and New Testaments

under his guidance Whenever I stuck fast and honestly confessed myself at

fault (Paula) would by no means rest content but would force me by fresh ques-

tions to point out to her which of many different solutions seemed to me the mostprobable

50 Though Jerome himself had learned Hebrew with great difficulty

Paula on making up her mind that she too would learn it succeeded so well

that she could chant the psalms in Hebrew and could speak the language without

a trace of the pronunciation peculiar to Latin The same accomplishments can

be seen to this day in her daughter Eustochium At least two of the ascetic

women were involved in the theological controversies of the time Marcella was

instrumental in having Origenists condemned in Rome51

and Melania the Elder

the friend of Rufinus was excoriated by Jerome for her alignment with Origen983085

ism Melania the Elder also had a reputation for serious study Palladius writes

that being very learned and loving literature she turned night into day perusing

every writing of the ancient commentators including three million (lines) of

Origen and two hundred fifty thousand of Gregory Stephen Pierus Basil

and other standard writers Nor did she read them once only and casually but

she laboriously went through each booiv seven or eight times52

Their intellectual pursuits were a means of understanding the tenets of the

church but they also sought understanding in a more concrete way The accounts

of the travels and adventures of Paula and Eustochium and of Melania the Elder

are filled with descriptions of people places and objects which were touched by

sanctity Though they deprived their bodies of material comforts they delighted

their souls with pilgrimages They wanted to see everything with their own eyes

and experience everything for themselves Of Paula in Jerusalem Jerome wrote

In visiting the holy places so great was the passion and enthusiasm she exhibited

for each that she could never have torn herself away from one had she not

been eager to visit the rest Before the cross she threw herself down in adora-

tion as though she beheld the Lord hanging upon it and when she entered the

tomb which was the scene of the Resurrection she kissed the stone which the

angel had rolled away from the door of the sepulchre Indeed so ardent was

her faith that she even licked with her mouth the very spot on which the Lords

body had lain like one athirst for the river which he has longed for53

When Melania the Elder arrived in Alexandria she sold what was left of her

possessions

and then went to the mount of Nitria where she met the following fathers and

their companions Pambo Arsisius Serapion the Great Paphnutius of Scete

Isidore the confessor bishop of Hermopolis and Dioscorus And she sojourned

with them half a year travelling about in the desert and visiting all the saints54

Their travel was perhaps a kind of souvenir983085hunting but it was imbued with a

passion for the historical concrete elements of the Christian tradition It was of

a piece with their intellectual curiosity This ascetic life offered mortification of

the flesh indeed but it also offered something more It must have seemed an ad- venture of the highest kind to throw over everything that was tedious and boring



160 CHURCH HISTORY

in Rome and to strike out for a life of freedom and the company of saints and wildmonks in the desertmiddot

THE EFFECTS OF ASCETICISM ON THE FOURTH-CENTURY

ROMAN ARISTOCRACY T H E RISE OF ASCETICISM

The fourth century witnessed both a rise in ascetic practices among the Roman aristocracy and a decline in the birth rate of the aristocracymiddot Though latefourth-century sources suggest that Christian asceticism was one of the causes ofdecreasing population65 it is more likely that the increase in asceticism and thedecrease in population were two phenomena that occurred simultaneously and inresponse to the same social conditions The growing independence of aristocraticwomen and the great expense of initiating children into adulthood have been seenas two of the causes of population decrease The practice of asceticism grew in

popularity as it became an increasingly acceptable way for women to exercise theirindependence and because it provided one answer to the financial burdens of childraising Though familial opposition to ascetic conversion suggested that the dissipation of family wealth and the failure of the line were to be avoided asceticismappears to have had two positive functions

The growing independence of aristocratic women can be traced as far backas the beginning of the third century when the little senate of ladies endeavoredto insure that aristocratic women who married outside the senatorial order wouldnot lose the social rank of their fathers At the same time Pope Callistus made asimilar ruling for the benefit of Christian aristocratic women who married non-aristocratic Christians Aristocratic women were beginning to exercise more control over the choice of their husbands than they had done before56 But althoughthey more often claimed for themselves the choice of whom they should marryuntil the fourth century aristocratic women nearly always married It was only inthe course of that century that unmarried aristocratic women began to appear67

Aristocratic women in the Roman Empire married early Literary and epi-graphic evidence08 indicates that 4203 percent of pagan women were first marriedbetween the ages of ten and fourteen Since mortality was high and divorce lawlenient there was a good chance that one or other of the marriage partners wouldparticipate in a second marriage Laws from the time of Augustus limited theperiod between marriages to two years for widows and eighteen months for divorced women The unmarried woman was an anomaly in aristocratic society59

The Christian Constantine abolished laws limiting the period between marriages

55 See for example Ambrose De Virginitate 11 24 35-38 Ambroses response that thepopulation was increasing in the East where asceticism flourished most has been echoedby AHM Jones The Social Background to the Struggle Between Paganism andChristianity p 17 However M K Hopkins in The Age of Boman Girls at Marriage Population Studies 18 (1965) 309-327 has presented epigraphie indications

that Christian aristocratie women of the fourth century tended to marry later than theirpagan peers Such a practice would possibly have a bearing on the birth rates of Christians

56 M i 131 133 Thi i M i th i i hi t i l t B




as well as the laws penalizing celibacy60

Asceticism in Rome was noticeablypresent for the first time during the fourth century As evidence of its appearance we have Jeromes descriptions of an ascetic fad among the aristocratic

women of Rome we have Ambroses account of the institutionalization of virginity within the church and we have an indication that a parallel institutionalization of widowhood was attempting to take root in the West These indicationsimpressionistic as they are suggest that asceticism was increasing in the Westand therefore that it had a function to fulfill in the society

In his letter to Eustochium on virginity Jerome makes several referencesto a fashionable asceticism which seems to have penetrated the competitive salonculture of Rome He says to Eustochium

Some women indeed actually disfigure themselves so as to make it obvious

that they have been fasting As soon as they catch sight of anyone they droptheir eyes and begin sobbing covering up the face all but a glimpse of one eyewhich they just keep free to watch the effect they make They wear a blackdress and a girdle of sackcloth their feet and hands are unwashed their stomachalonemdashbecause it cannot be seenmdashis busy churning foodmiddot

1

Again he says Cast from you like the plague those idle and inquisitive virginsand widows who go about to married womens houses and surpass the very parasites in a play by their unblushing effrontery

Ambroses campaign on behalf of virginity was successful enough to bringabout an order of virgins in the church in Milan

62 Virgins were often dedicated

to God by their parents at birth as was the case with Asella and with Paula theYounger Under Ambrose these children who had been devoted to God tookpublic vows of virginity in a ceremony of consecration when they reached puberty

63

After their consecration they continued to live with their parents but were underthe special care of the bishop

64 They sat together in a special screened-off area

of the church Ambrose prescribed for them a life of a seclusion devotion and abstinence

65 They became a recognized part of church life

Jeromes treatment of Blessilla and Marcella in particular suggests that hisdealings with the Western women may have been influenced by the Eastern concept of Christian widowhood In the East the early Christian order of widowshad by the third century begun to work actively among the women members ofthe congregation In the same century this group began to share some of the functions of the made order of deacons The third-century order of deaconesses thendrew from both the diaconate and the order of widows in establishing itself as athird entity Deaconesses did not appear in the West before the fifth century

66

The Eastern order of widows expanding as it did into the order of deaconessesseems to have provided widows with a more viable place in the life of the churchthan was offered them in the West In this respect as he did in so many othersJerome may have been acting as a conductor of Eastern innovations to the West

60 Ibid p 22261 Jer Ep 2227 Eng tr in Select Letters pp 117 and 12362 Amb De Virginibus 157 59 But see ibid 1 57 58 for his problems with overcoming



162 CHURCH HISTORY

The rise of asceticism provided the aristocratic woman with an increasingly

acceptable alternative to marriage She might either remain a virgin or after the

death of her husband remain a widow The dedication of a virgin by her parents

is a practice that should be considered in more detail While it was necessary tohave enough children to insure the continuation of the line the great expense of

initiating children into adulthood could be ruinous to a family with too many chil

dren for its resources to bear67 It was necessary to provide each daughter with

a sufficient dowry and each son with a respectable celebration of quaestorian and

praetorian games68

Dedication to virginity may have been a way of providing for

surplus daughters without straining the resources of the family Sons could then

be launched into the senatorial order in a fitting way and other daughters could

be given a dowry adequate enough to insure for them an appropriate marriage

Parents lacked control both in limiting and in sustaining their families Onthe one hand there was little notion of contraception69 on the other hand the

high mortality rate often rendered futile their attempts to insure the continuation

of the line The practice of dedication of daughters to virginity may have returned

to the parents some element of control over the number of children whose entry

into adulthood could be adequately financed by the family

T H E EFFE CTS OF ASCETICISM ON TH E FOURTH-CENTURY ROMAN ARISTOCRACY

T H E CHRISTIANIZATION OF TH E HOUSEHOLD AND THE FAILURE OF ASCETICISM

Jeromes ascetic response to the concept of marriage has been mentioned

70

But there is another side to his attitude toward marriage it is perhaps summed

up in his words I praise marriage because it produces virgins for me 71 Less

flippantly he quotes Paul The woman that hath an husband that believeth not

and if he be pleased to dwell with her let her not leave him For the unbelieving

husband is sanctified by the believing wife and the unbelieving wife is sanctified

by the believing husband else were your children unclean but now they are holy72

In this same letter to Laeta on the education of her daughter Paula the Younger

Jerome describes two purposes of the marriage of a Christian the conversion of

the other members of the household to Christianity and the education of a new

Christian generation The final end of the Christianization of the household forJerome is the production of Christian ascetics

In his letter to Laeta Jerome suggests that one result of her Christian house

hold will be the conversion of her father a pontifex Vestae to Christianity

Who would have believed that the granddaughter of the Roman pontiff Albinuswould be born in answer to a mothers vows that the grandfather would standby and rejoice while the babys yet stammering tongue cried Alleluia andthat even the old man would nurse in his arms one of Christs own virgins We

67 M K Hopkins discusses this problem of a balancing act in his Elite Mobility in the

Roman Empire pp 24-26 By the mid-fourth century three children was considered theupper limit or the unattainable ideal for aristocratic families due to the high rate of infant mortality The survival of too many children however would be as disastrous to thefamily fortune as the survival of none




did weU to expect this happy issue The one unbeliever is sanctified by a saintly

household of believers73

There are in fact two instances of conversions by Christian women of their pagan

male relatives Jerome alludes to one in his letter to Laeta Her husband Toxotiuswas a pagan when he married Laeta in spite of the fact that his mother Paula

and all his sisters were Christians He was apparently converted after his mar

riage Volusianus was the pagan son of a pagan father and Christian mother

his sister Albina the Younger was Christian and it was his Christian niece

Melania the Younger who converted him to Christianity as he lay on his death

bed74 It was not entirely fanciful for Jerome to suggest that Laetas father one

of the inner circle of staunch pagans might be converted by the Christianity of

his household

But the primary point of Jeromes letter was to outline the ideal education of

a Christian girl Paula was to be raised in a strictly Christian environment75 Her

maid and all the women servants around her were to be of sedate and unworldly

character From her earliest years she was to be encouraged in learning in the

guise of games76 She was also to be instructed from the very beginning about

her paternal grandmother and aunt Paula and Eustochium Let her crave their

company and threaten you that she will leave you for them7T As Paula grew older

she was to be dressed as simply as possible without the aid of cosmetics or jew

elry78 She was never to be separated from the watchful eyes of her mother70 She

should eat simple dishes and with restraint she should take a little wine only for

her health80

She should be deaf to all musical instruments81

Jerome devotes a large proportion of the letter to the problem of Paulas

education She was to memorize portions of the scripture daily in Greek and

Latin He sets down the order in which she was to study them beginning with

the Psalter and ending with the Song of Songs for if she were to read it at the

beginning she might be harmed by not perceiving that it was the song of a spiritual

bridal expressed in fleshly language82 She was to read Cyprian Athanasius

Hilary and those others who maintain in their books a steady love of the faith83

Anything else should be read only from a critical point of view The culmina

tion of Jeromes long letter to Laeta is a charge Do not take up a burden whichyou cannot bear84 In order to raise Paula as a true ascetic it would be best to

send her to her grandmather Paula and her aunt Eustochium There far away

from the influences of Rome she will be taught in such a way that she will be a

credit to the church What Jerome described in his letter to Laeta and what he

repeated in his letter to the baby Pacatula85 is a careful and deliberate socializa

tion of the child by the household For Jerome the success of the Christian house

hold is measured by the asceticism of its children Since the children are not

raised according to the values and expectations of the larger society which might

73 Ibid Eng tr in Select Letters pp 339-341

74 Gerontius Vita S Melania ed Rampolla pp 53-5575 Jer Ep 107476 Ibid 1074



164 CHURCH HISTORY

be pagan or nominally Christian or syncretic the values which they receivethrough their socialization within the household must be particularly strong Thebest household environment Jerome suggests would be the one that most closely

approximated the environment of JerusalemA similar situation existed in the Puritan household of pre-revolutionary

England86 A Puritan writing at the time said that it was important for catechizing to be carried on at home because houses are the nurseries of the Church

87

The household became spiritualized its purpose was to fill the ranks of thefaithful The distinction between seventeenth-century asceticism and fourth-centuryasceticism is important however because it contains the answer to the failure ofJeromes dream In seventeenth-century England Puritan asceticism acted positively to bring the actual world into consonance with its own vision of the good

society In the words of Max Weber it was an inner-worldly asceticism Activeasceticism operates within the world rationally active asceticism in mastering theworld seeks to tame what is creatural and wicked through work in a worldlyVocation88

In contrast to inner-worldly asceticism Weber posits an other-worldly asceticism or asceticist flight from the world If active asceticism confines itself tokeeping down and to overcoming creatural wickedness in the actors own nature it then enhances the concentration on the firmly established God-willed andactive redemptory accomplishments to the point of avoiding any action in the

orders of the world

89

Puritan asceticism effected a revolution within the household which produced a new generation of inner-worldly ascetics The asceticismof the fourth century was other-worldly rather than inner-worldly the goal offourth-century asceticism was not the mastery of the world but the mastery ofself Jeromes dream of a society of Christian households busily producing futureascetics was doomed to fail Most prosaically his Christian families would soondie out if they were to produce only ascetics But secondly the typical responseof the larger society to asceticism is opposition If the asceticism is of the inner-worldly type it will attempt to overcome that opposition as in the case of PuritanEngland But if the asceticism is other-worldly it will make no attempt to deal

with the response of the larger society and so will have little or no positive impacton the society

Fourth-century ascetics quite literally fled from Roman society The resultwas that with the influence of asceticism minimized by distance both physical andpsychological the way was open for a syncretic working-out of the pagan andChristian cultures00 Though the commitment to the ascetic life may have beenrejected by the larger society as counter-productive Christianity itself was seenin an increasingly positive light We see indications of a new syncretism in thefamilies of the ascetic women Albinus the pagan grandfather of Melania the

Younger a character in the Saturnalia and a friend of Symmachus corresponded86 See Christopher Hill Society and Puritanism in Pre-Bevolutionary England (New York

Schocken Books 1964) pp 443 481 The Spiritualization of Icirche Household




with Ambrose on points of doctrine01

His son Volusianus who remained a paganup to his death-bed conversion corresponded with Augustine on questions of theChristian faith

92 The proximity of paganism and Christianity within the fami

lies of the late Roman aristocracy was probably the single most potent factor inthe gradual substitution of Christianity for paganism as the religion of the senatorial order

It has been suggested first by fourth- and fifth-century contemporaries93

thenby Gibbon

94 and more recently by AHM Jones

95 that Christianity contributed

to the weakening of the Roman Empire by positing an alternative ethos to that of Roma aeterna Paulinus of Nola the friend and relative of Melania the Elderbears out this suggestion in a letter which expresses his sentiments on Romansociety We ought not to put loyalties or fatherland or distinctions or riches be

fore God for scripture says The fashion of this world passeth away Andthose who love this world will also perish with it

96 The present group of ascetic

women also corrobrate the notion of a Christian asceticism alien to the traditionalaristocratic ethos They provided Jerome the chief architect of fourth-centuryasceticism with the examples he used to inspire and prod more hesitant disciplesThey were an important weapon in his propaganda war against the Romanaristocracy

The gradual Christianization of the Roman aristocracy in the fourth and fifthcenturies has been laid at the feet of the women of the aristocracy but the drift

into respectable Christianity was accomplished in spite of the presence of onegroup of women whose Christianity was most certainly not respectable LikePaulinus of Nola they would not effect a transformation of their society becauseof their certainty that only in fleeing that society would they arrive at the Endthey so fervently desired

91 Chastagnol pp 247-248 argues for this identification92 Augustine Epistolae 135 13693 8ee Augustine The City of God 13594 Gibbon Decline and Fall chap 3135 AHM Jones The Decline of the Ancient World (New York Holt Binehart and Win

ston Inc 1966) p 369

96 Paul of Nola Ep 252 Eng tr in Letters tr P G Walsh (Westminster MarylandNewman Prese 1966)



^ s

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150 CHURCH HISTORY

STEMMA OF THE CAEIONII FAMILY

C Caeionius Ruf ius Volusianusconsul 311 and 314

Caeionius Ruf ius Albinusconsul 335 and 345

C Caeionius RufiusVolusianus Lampadiuspraefectus populi 355praefectus urbis 365m Caecinia Lolliana

AVbina ght

Marcella

a daughter

Asella Pammachius

IC Rufius

Albinuspraefectus

urbis 389-391m a Christian

ILollianad 371

Publilius CCaecina Albinuspontifex Vestaeconsul of Numidia365m a Christian

CaeioniusVolusianus

Albinam Valerius

Publicoacutela

RufiusAntonius

A Volusianuspraefectus

urbis 417-418praefectus

populi 428-429Caecina Decius

Albinuspraefectus urbis

402

CaeioniusC Gregorius

Valeria Melaniam Valerius Pinianus

Sabina Runtildea

Laetam JuliusToxotius

Paula

PARTIAL STEMMA OF MELANIA THE ELDER

Antonius Marcellinusconsul 341 Pontius Paulinuspraef Gall

Ant Marcellinus m Pontia Paulina

the

Pontius Paulinus of Nola

Melania the Elderm Valerius Maximus

Valerius Publicoacutela m Caeonia Albina

Valeria Melania junior

P A R T I A L S T E M M A O P P A U L A

Rogatus m Blessilla





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Cristianización en el siglo IV y la conversión de mujeres

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