Cambridge Ancient Hi.. - Index of

210 8. administration and politics in the cities
at first, different in east and west. In the west, the first stages of the spread
of monasteries were controlled by bishops, so that the number and wealth
of monasteries actually strengthened the power of the bishop over city and
suburb. It was only later, in the seventh and eighth centuries, that the establishment
of rural monasteries in northern and north-eastern Gaul by
members of the Frankish aristocracy was one of the factors contributing
to the break-up of the classical civitas as a political unit in that area. 30 In the
east, monasteries were generally founded well outside cities and without the
participation of the bishop. Abbots and holy men established a close relationship
with the population of neighbouring villages and became their
patrons vis-à-vis the authorities of city or empire. 31
One of the attractions of the classical city was that it was the centre of literary
culture, whose continuity was ensured by the availability of teachers,
with the higher rhetorical education only being provided at regional centres.
Cassiodorus explained that to be able to get one’s children educated, and so
to ensure the continuance of the cultural tradition, was a strong reason for
keeping one’s main residence in a city (Variae viii.31). So the survival of
cities, or rather their continuing to be the centre where the leaders of a region
lived, was linked with the continued prestige of secular literary culture. But
this was under pressure during the whole of our period. The Bible was steadily
taking over more of the ground that had been occupied by classical
authors, and the ascetic ideal had no place for secular literature at all, and
could be pursued quite without book knowledge. 32 Now this development
had very different consequences in east and west in our period. In many cities
of the east, literary culture and Christianity continued to coexist through the
sixth century. 33 The poems of Dioscorus of Aphrodito and the speeches of
Choricius of Gaza are evidence of this. During this period in the west, literary
education came to be restricted to an ever narrowing group of leading
families at a few centres of government. Cities ceased to have schools, and
the transmission of higher literary culture was left to private tutors and ultimately
to the church. 34 But in the seventh century the same trend became
conspicuous in the east as well. Books became scarce, and learning was
increasingly restricted to clergy and Constantinople. 35
ii. the cities of the east
The written material for the study of the political and administrative development
of the late Roman city in the east comes principally from three
30 Prinz (1965), particularly chs. iv and v; Wood, Merovingian Kingdoms 193–4.
31 Well illustrated in S ˇ evčenko (1984) and Mitchell, Anatolia ii.122–50. See also p. 217 below.
32 Markus (1990) 199–211.
33 Mid-fifth-century Seleucia: Dagron (1978); sixth-century: Bowersock, Hellenism; MacCoull,
Dioscorus. 34 Riché (1973). 35 Wilson (1983) 58–9; Lemerle (1971) 74–85; Mango (1980) 130–7.
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