Religious Intolerance in the Later Roman Empire - Bad request ...

also included those of “adequate resources” which presumably implied those of a lower
status than decurions, i.e. plebeians. But this law of Valentinian made clear the
situation as it had doubtless existed in practice since Constantine and made clear that
everyone who had sufficient wealth was to put the interests of his m unicipium beyond
those of his church.
CTh 12.1.59 of 12 September 364 was also addressed to the inhabitants of
Byzacium. It appears to be a partial revision of the previous law, and allowed a
grudging concession to the Church. It allowed men of curial status to join the Church,
but only on condition that they transfer their property to a “near kinsman” thus
allowing the kinsman to serve the council; or, they would have to surrender their
property to the council instead before joining the Church themselves. The law is
retrospective: anyone who had already joined the Church without doing one or either
of these two measures would have to leave the Church and join the council. Evidently
the law was designed to allow some quarter to men of curial status if they really did
wish to become clergy, but at the same time it preserved absolutely the ability of, and
finance for, the municipal councils to function. However at the same time, the law
extended to “any person [who] should choose service in the Church” 30 thus including
not just the clergy, but also, presumably, anyone else working for the Church. No
punishments were laid down in either of these laws, although at the same time they did
not offer any of the conciliatory rhetoric or measures which Constantine’s CTh.
16.2.3 had contained.
CTh. 9.40.8 of 15 January 365 was addressed to Symmachus, prefect of Rome, 31
and prevented Christians from being “sentenced to the arena” for any crime at all. It
ordered “severe censure” for any judge who gave such a sentence to a Christian and
also, unusually, ordered that his “office staff [should] incur a very heavy fine. 32 This
30 Qui partes eligit ecclesiae
31 L. Aurelius Avianius Symmachus signo Phosphorius 3 PLRE 1.863-865
32 Quicum que Christianus sit in quolibet crim ine deprehensus, ludo non adiudicetur. Quod si quisquam
iudicum fecerit, et ipse grav iter n otabitur et officium eius m ultae m axim ae subiacebit
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