The Dark Ages. David Hume

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СКАЧАТЬ and his seat was transferred for some years from Thessalonica to Sirmium.56

      After the departure of her daughter the Empress probably felt lonely, and she undertook, in accordance with her husband’s wishes, a pilgrimage to Jerusalem to return thanks to the Deity for the marriage of their daughter.57 In this decision they seem to have been confirmed by a saintly lady of high reputation, Melania by name, a Roman of noble family, who had been forced into a repugnant marriage, and had afterwards, along with her husband, whom she converted to Christianity, taken up her abode at first in the land of Egypt, where she founded monastic houses, and then at Jerusalem. She had visited Constantinople to see her uncle Volusian, whom she converted before his death, and she exercised considerable influence with the Emperor and his household. The journey of Eudocia to Jerusalem (in spring, A.D. 438) was marked by her visit to Antioch, where she created a sensation by the elegant oration which she delivered, posing rather as one trained in Greek rhetoric and devoted to Hellenic traditions and proud of her Athenian descent, than as a pilgrim on her way to the great Christian shrine. Although there was a large element of theological bigotry both in Antioch and in Alexandria, yet in both these cities there was probably more appreciation of Hellenic style and polish than in Constantinople. The last words of Eudocia’s oration brought down the house — a quotation from Homer,

      ὑμετέρης γενέης τε καὶ αἵματος εὔχομαι εἶναι

      “I boast that I am of your race and blood.”58 The city that hated and mocked the Emperor Julian and his pagan Hellenism loved and fêted the Empress Eudocia with her Christian Hellenism; a golden statue was erected to her in the curia and one of bronze in the museum. Her interest in Antioch took a practical form, for she induced Theodosius to build a new basilica, restore the thermae, extend the walls, and bestow other marks of favour on the city.

      Eudocia’s visit to Aelia Capitolina, as Jerusalem was called, brings to the recollection the visit of Constantine’s mother Helena, one hundred years before, and, although Christianity had lost some of its freshness in the intervening period, it must have been a strange and impressive experience for one whose youth was spent amid pagan memories in the gardens of the philosophers at Athens, who in New Rome, with its museums of ancient art and its men of many creeds, had not been entirely weaned from the ways and affections of her youth, to visit, with all the solemnity of an exalted Christian pilgrim, a city whose memories were typically opposed to Hellenism, and whose monuments were the bones and relics of saints.59 It was probably only this religious side that came under Eudocia’s notice; for Jerusalem at this period was a strange mixture of piety with gross licence. We are told by an ecclesiastical writer of the age that it was more depraved than Gomorrah; and the fact that it was a garrison town had something to do with this depravity. But it drew pilgrims from all quarters of the world.

      On her return from Palestine (A.D. 439) Eudocia’s influence at Court was still powerful.60 She seems to have been on terms of intimate friendship with Cyrus of Panopolis, who held a very exceptional position. He filled at the same time the two high offices of Praetorian Prefect of the East and Prefect of the city.61 He was a poet like his fellow-townsman Nonnus though of minor rank;62 he was a student of art and architecture; and he was a “Hellene” in faith. It has been remarked that Imperial officialdom was beginning to assume in the East a more distinctly Greek complexion in the reign of Theodosius II, and Cyrus was a representative figure in this transition. He used to issue decrees in Greek, an innovation for which a writer of the following century expressly blames him.63 His prefecture was popular and long remembered at Constantinople, for he built and restored many buildings and improved the illumination of the town, so that the people enthusiastically cried on some occasions in the Hippodrome, “Constantine built the city but Cyrus renewed it.”64 He still held his offices in the autumn of A.D. 441,65 but it could not be long after this that he fell into disgrace. Perhaps his popularity made him an object of suspicion; his paganism furnished a convenient ground for accusation. He was compelled to take ecclesiastical orders and was made bishop of Cotyaeum in Phrygia. His first sermon, which his malicious congregation forced him to preach against his will, astonished and was applauded by those who heard it:

      “Brethren, let the birth of God, our Saviour, Jesus Christ be honoured by silence, because the Word of God was conceived in the holy Virgin through hearing only. To him be glory for ever and ever. Amen.”66

      The friendship between Cyrus and the Empress Eudocia, who was naturally sympathetic with a highly educated pagan, suggests the conjecture that his disgrace was not unconnected with the circumstances which led soon afterwards to her own fall. We may conjecture that harmony had not always existed between herself and her sister-in-law, and differences seem to have arisen soon after her return from Palestine.67 Discord was fomented by the arts of a eunuch, Chrysaphius Zstommas, who was at this time beginning to establish his ascendancy over the Emperor.68 Pulcheria had enjoyed the privilege of having in her household the Chamberlain (praepositus Augustae) who was officially attached to the service of the reigning Empress. It would not have been unnatural if this arrangement had caused jealousy in the heart of Eudocia, and we are told that Chrysaphius urged her to demand from the Emperor that a High Chamberlain should also be assigned to her. When Theodosius decidedly refused, she urged, again at the suggestion of Chrysaphius, that Pulcheria should be ordained a deaconess, inasmuch as she had taken a vow of virginity. Pulcheria refused to be drawn into a contest for power. She sent her Chamberlain to Eudocia and retired to the Palace of Hebdomon.69 When Chrysaphius had succeeded in removing one Empress from the scene, his next object was to remove the other, so that his own influence over the weak spirit of Theodosius might be exclusive and undivided. In accomplishing this end he was probably assisted by the orthodox party at court, who were devoted to Pulcheria and looked with suspicion on the Hellenic proclivities of her sister-in-law. The Emperor’s mind was poisoned against his wife by the suggestion that she had been unduly intimate with Paulinus,70 a handsome man who had been a comrade of the Emperor in his boyhood.

      This is probably the kernel of truth in the legend of Eudocia’s apple which is thus told by a chronicler.71

      It so happened that as the Emperor Theodosius was proceeding to the church on the feast of Epiphany, the Master of Offices, Paulinus, being indisposed on account of an ailment in his foot, remained at home and made an excuse. But a certain poor man brought to Theodosius a Phrygian apple,72 of enormously large size, and the Emperor was surprised at it, and all his Court (senate). And straightway the Emperor gave 150 nomismata to the man who brought the apple, and sent it to Eudocia Augusta; and the Augusta sent it to Paulinus, the Master of Offices, as being a friend of the Emperor.73 But Paulinus, not being aware that the Emperor had sent it to the Empress, took it and sent it to the Emperor Theodosius, even as he entered the Palace. And when the Emperor received it he recognised it and concealed it. And having called the Augusta, he questioned her, saying, ‘Where is the apple that I sent you?’ And she said, ‘I ate it.’ Then he caused her to swear the truth by his salvation, whether she ate it or sent it to some one; and she sware, ‘I sent it unto no man but ate it.’ And the Emperor commanded the apple to be brought and showed it to her. And he was indignant against her, suspecting that she was enamoured of Paulinus and sent him the apple and denied it. And on this account Theodosius put Paulinus to death. And the Empress Eudocia was grieved, and thought herself insulted, for it was known everywhere that Paulinus was slain on account of her, for he was a very handsome young man. And she asked the Emperor that she might go to the holy places to pray; and he allowed her. And she went down from Constantinople to Jerusalem to pray. Whatever may have been the circumstances it seems that Paulinus, Master of Offices, was sent to Cappadocia and put to death by the Emperor’s command in A.D. 444.74 It is credible that her former intimacy with Paulinus was used to alienate Theodosius from his wife, and she found her position so intolerable that at last she sought and obtained the Emperor’s permission to withdraw from the Court and betake СКАЧАТЬ