To make this more manageable, I will take several posts to accumulate references, before commenting on them. This will allow a better vantage point to start a discussion.
Simon Corcoran, The Empire of the Tetrarchs, p. 24
In a few cases the documentary and other sources coincide, allowing comparison of texts, and providing support for the genuineness and accuracy of manuscript versions. Thus part of the edictum de Accusationibus occurs in the codes. As already noted above, two Latin copies preserve the conclusion of the rescript of Maximinus on the Christians, of which Eusebius gives an almost entire Greek translation, and Eusebius also gives the Greek version of Constantine's letter to Palestine, which he claims was circulated in the east, and of which a contemporary fragment has been recovered from Egypt.
(i) the rescript of Maximinus on the Christians [312]
Stephen Mitchell, "Maximinus and the Christians in A.D. 312: A New Latin Inscription," pp. 108-109.
http://www.constantinethegreatcoins.com ... stians.pdf
... let them take delight through the peace that has finally been allowed to them. And may those who, after being freed from those blind and wandering(?) by-ways, have returned to a right and goodly frame of mind, rejoice most of all, and, as though preserved from a sudden tempest or snatched from a grave illness, let them henceforward feel a more pleasant enjoyment of life. But as for those who have persisted in the abominable cult, let them be separated, just as you ask, far from your city and territory, and be removed, whereby, in accord with the praiseworthy zeal of your petition, your city, separated from the stain of every impiety, may respond, as it has been accustomed, to the sacred rites of the immortal gods with the worship which is owed to them. Moreover, so that you may know the degree to which your petition has been gratifying to us, behold, without any decree or any prayers on your part, with spontaneous accord according to our just and benevolent spirit, we grant permission to your devotion to request, in return for your religious resolution of that sort, whatsoever bounty you want. And may you do and request this now in the knowledge that you will obtain without any postponement something which, when granted to your city for all time, may as much bear witness to our own religious piety towards the immortal gods as it may show to your sons and grandsons that you have achieved rewards worthy of your traditions from our clemency. Fare well. Issued on 6 April in the second consulship of the emperors Constantine and Licinius (A.D. 312) at Sardis to the people of Colbassa.
(Eusebius) It appears to me necessary to insert here this document of Maximinus which was posted on pillars, in order that there may be made manifest at the same time the boastful and haughty arrogance of the God-hating man, and the sleepless evil-hating divine vengeance upon the impious, which followed close upon him, and under whose pressure he not long afterward took the opposite course in respect to us and confirmed it by written laws.
The rescript is in the following words:
Copy of a translation of the rescript of Maximinus in answer to the memorials against us, taken from the pillar in Tyre.
3. “Now at length the feeble power of the human mind has become able to shake off and to scatter every dark mist of error, which before this besieged the senses of men, who were more miserable than impious, and enveloped them in dark and destructive ignorance; and to perceive that it is governed and established by the beneficent providence of the immortal gods.
4. It passes belief how grateful, how pleasing and how agreeable it is to us, that you have given a most decided proof of your pious resolution; for even before this it was known to every one how much regard and reverence you were paying to the immortal gods, exhibiting not a faith of bare and empty words, but continued and wonderful examples of illustrious deeds.
5. Wherefore your city may justly be called a seat and dwelling of the immortal gods. At least, it appears by many signs that it flourishes because of the presence of the celestial gods.
6. Behold, therefore, your city, regardless of all private advantages, and omitting its former petitions in its own behalf, when it perceived that the adherents of that execrable vanity were again beginning to spread, and to start the greatest conflagration,—like a neglected and extinguished funeral pile when its brands are rekindled,—immediately resorted to our piety as to a metropolis of all religiousness, asking some remedy and aid.
7. It is evident that the gods have given you this saving mind on account of your faith and piety.
“Accordingly that supreme and mightiest Jove, who presides over your illustrious city, who preserves your ancestral gods, your wives and children, your hearths and homes from every destructive pest, has infused into your souls this wholesome resolve; showing and proving how excellent and glorious and salutary it is to observe with the becoming reverence the worship and sacred rites of the immortal gods.
8. For who can be found so ignorant or so devoid of all understanding as not to perceive that it is due to the kindly care of the gods that the earth does not refuse the seed sown in it, nor disappoint the hope of the husbandmen with vain expectation; that impious war is not inevitably fixed upon earth, and wasted bodies dragged down to death under the influence of a corrupted atmosphere; that the sea is not swollen and raised on high by blasts of intemperate winds; that unexpected hurricanes do not burst forth and stir up the destructive tempest; moreover, that the earth, the nourisher and mother of all, is not shaken from its lowest depths with a terrible tremor, and that the mountains upon it do not sink into the opening chasms. No one is ignorant that all these, and evils still worse than these, have oftentimes happened hitherto.
9. And all these misfortunes have taken place on account of the destructive error of the empty vanity of those impious men, when it prevailed in their souls, and, we may almost say, weighed down the whole world with shame.”
10. After other words he adds: “Let them look at the standing crops already flourishing with waving heads in the broad fields, and at the meadows glittering with plants and flowers, in response to abundant rains and the restored mildness and softness of the atmosphere.
[Fragment Corresponds to 11-14]
11. Finally, let all rejoice that the might of the most powerful and terrible Mars has been propitiated by our piety, our sacrifices, and our veneration; and let them on this account enjoy firm and tranquil peace and quiet; and let as many as have wholly abandoned that blind error and delusion and have returned to a right and sound mind rejoice the more, as those who have been rescued from an unexpected storm or severe disease and are to reap the fruits of pleasure for the rest of their life.
12. But if they still persist in their execrable vanity, let them, as you have desired, be driven far away from your city and territory, that thus, in accordance with your praiseworthy zeal in this matter, your city, being freed from every pollution and impiety, may, according to its native disposition, attend to the sacred rites of the immortal gods with becoming reverence.
13. But that ye may know how acceptable to us your request respecting this matter has been, and how ready our mind is to confer benefits voluntarily, without memorials and petitions, we permit your devotion to ask whatever great gift ye may desire in return for this your pious disposition.
14. And now ask that this may be done and that ye may receive it; for ye shall obtain it without delay. This, being granted to your city, shall furnish for all time an evidence of reverent piety toward the immortal gods, and of the fact that you have obtained from our benevolence merited prizes for this choice of yours; and it shall be shown to your children and children’s children.”
The rescript is in the following words:
Copy of a translation of the rescript of Maximinus in answer to the memorials against us, taken from the pillar in Tyre.
3. “Now at length the feeble power of the human mind has become able to shake off and to scatter every dark mist of error, which before this besieged the senses of men, who were more miserable than impious, and enveloped them in dark and destructive ignorance; and to perceive that it is governed and established by the beneficent providence of the immortal gods.
4. It passes belief how grateful, how pleasing and how agreeable it is to us, that you have given a most decided proof of your pious resolution; for even before this it was known to every one how much regard and reverence you were paying to the immortal gods, exhibiting not a faith of bare and empty words, but continued and wonderful examples of illustrious deeds.
5. Wherefore your city may justly be called a seat and dwelling of the immortal gods. At least, it appears by many signs that it flourishes because of the presence of the celestial gods.
6. Behold, therefore, your city, regardless of all private advantages, and omitting its former petitions in its own behalf, when it perceived that the adherents of that execrable vanity were again beginning to spread, and to start the greatest conflagration,—like a neglected and extinguished funeral pile when its brands are rekindled,—immediately resorted to our piety as to a metropolis of all religiousness, asking some remedy and aid.
7. It is evident that the gods have given you this saving mind on account of your faith and piety.
“Accordingly that supreme and mightiest Jove, who presides over your illustrious city, who preserves your ancestral gods, your wives and children, your hearths and homes from every destructive pest, has infused into your souls this wholesome resolve; showing and proving how excellent and glorious and salutary it is to observe with the becoming reverence the worship and sacred rites of the immortal gods.
8. For who can be found so ignorant or so devoid of all understanding as not to perceive that it is due to the kindly care of the gods that the earth does not refuse the seed sown in it, nor disappoint the hope of the husbandmen with vain expectation; that impious war is not inevitably fixed upon earth, and wasted bodies dragged down to death under the influence of a corrupted atmosphere; that the sea is not swollen and raised on high by blasts of intemperate winds; that unexpected hurricanes do not burst forth and stir up the destructive tempest; moreover, that the earth, the nourisher and mother of all, is not shaken from its lowest depths with a terrible tremor, and that the mountains upon it do not sink into the opening chasms. No one is ignorant that all these, and evils still worse than these, have oftentimes happened hitherto.
9. And all these misfortunes have taken place on account of the destructive error of the empty vanity of those impious men, when it prevailed in their souls, and, we may almost say, weighed down the whole world with shame.”
10. After other words he adds: “Let them look at the standing crops already flourishing with waving heads in the broad fields, and at the meadows glittering with plants and flowers, in response to abundant rains and the restored mildness and softness of the atmosphere.
[Fragment Corresponds to 11-14]
11. Finally, let all rejoice that the might of the most powerful and terrible Mars has been propitiated by our piety, our sacrifices, and our veneration; and let them on this account enjoy firm and tranquil peace and quiet; and let as many as have wholly abandoned that blind error and delusion and have returned to a right and sound mind rejoice the more, as those who have been rescued from an unexpected storm or severe disease and are to reap the fruits of pleasure for the rest of their life.
12. But if they still persist in their execrable vanity, let them, as you have desired, be driven far away from your city and territory, that thus, in accordance with your praiseworthy zeal in this matter, your city, being freed from every pollution and impiety, may, according to its native disposition, attend to the sacred rites of the immortal gods with becoming reverence.
13. But that ye may know how acceptable to us your request respecting this matter has been, and how ready our mind is to confer benefits voluntarily, without memorials and petitions, we permit your devotion to ask whatever great gift ye may desire in return for this your pious disposition.
14. And now ask that this may be done and that ye may receive it; for ye shall obtain it without delay. This, being granted to your city, shall furnish for all time an evidence of reverent piety toward the immortal gods, and of the fact that you have obtained from our benevolence merited prizes for this choice of yours; and it shall be shown to your children and children’s children.”
(ii) edictum de Accusationibus [314]
https://droitromain.univ-grenoble-alpes ... ohnson.htm
(Johnson, Coleman-Norton & Bourne, Ancient Roman Statutes, Austin, 1961, p. 239, n. 302).
Two chapters of this edict are preserved in CTh. 9, 5 and in CJ 9, 8, 3. Three copies of the edict on stone have been discovered : one somewhere in Asia Minor, before 1600, but now lost ; one in Lycia, also in Asia Minor, before 1902 ; one in Crete, reported in 1889, which exhibits all of the surviving part of the edict. The date is doubtful, for the superscription and the subscription preserved in the codes do not agree by an interval of about a decade, but the codes and the stones all agree in the subscription, which is dated 314 A.D.
1) Copy of the sacred edict.
2) . . . it has been proved that very many persons not only in respect to their fortunes . . . accusations . . . sometimes . . . by cases of this kind those who are accused as well as those who are summoned for evidence are afflicted with very serious annoyances. Wherefore, taking counsel for the security of our provinces, we provide remedies of this character, that an accuser indeed may not entirely be repulsed from court, but whoever believes that he can add proofs to his charges may have the free opporunity to approach a judge and may reveal the defendant by clear evidence of the offenses, so that according to the nature of the deeds suitable punishment may be inflicted on the person who is convicted. But if he is not at all able to establish those charges which he makes he shall know that he must be subjected to a very severe sentence.
3) To be sure, if anyone charges someone with the crime of treason, since the accusation of such a kind not at all protects anyone by the privilege of any high rank from a very strict inquisition, he shall know that he also must be subject to torture if he is not able to establish his accusation by other clear evidences and proofs, since in the case of the person who is detected in this temerity this fact properly shall be elicited also by torture, namely, by whose advice and instigation it appears that he entered upon the accusation, so that punishment from all persons who are accessory to so great a deed can be exacted.
4) Moreover, it is known to all how often an opportunity also to approach a judge has been denied to informers not only by the statutes of our parents, but also by our ordinances, since a hearing must not be granted to persons of this kind, because indeed they must be subjected to punishment in accordance with the daring of such great wickedness.
5) Also in the case of slaves or of freedmen who attempt to accuse or to report their masters or their patrons we decree that the law according to the statute of the ancient law also must be observed, namely, that, to be sure, the declaration of such atrocious audacity shall be repressed immediately in the inception of its commission itself by the judge's decision, and, after a hearing has been denied, whoever proceeds to the desperate boldness of this kind shall offer, affixed to a gibbet, an example to all others, lest anyone of like audacity should appear in the future.
6) To be sure, that everywhere counsel may be taken for the security of innocent persons, it is our pleasure that defamatory informations shall not be accepted. And if anyone discovers these displayed anonymously, he shall be bound to remove them immediately and to tear them in pieces or to consume them by fire. And in these cases it shall be proper for the judges to take note of such a kind that, if perchance such information is brought to them, they shall direct it to be burned by fire, since a writing of such kind properly shall be removed completely from a judge's hearing, but an investigation shall remain against those persons who dare to display information of such a sort, that, when discovered, they shall be subjected to the due punishments of their temerity.
7) Accordingly, we have written about all these matters not only to our prefects but also to the governors and the treasurer and the master of our private estate, by whose other copy, when our edict has been published, it is declared most fully what kind of law and statute it contains.
8) Publicly posted January I in the consulship of Volusianus and Annianus.
Two chapters of this edict are preserved in CTh. 9, 5 and in CJ 9, 8, 3. Three copies of the edict on stone have been discovered : one somewhere in Asia Minor, before 1600, but now lost ; one in Lycia, also in Asia Minor, before 1902 ; one in Crete, reported in 1889, which exhibits all of the surviving part of the edict. The date is doubtful, for the superscription and the subscription preserved in the codes do not agree by an interval of about a decade, but the codes and the stones all agree in the subscription, which is dated 314 A.D.
1) Copy of the sacred edict.
2) . . . it has been proved that very many persons not only in respect to their fortunes . . . accusations . . . sometimes . . . by cases of this kind those who are accused as well as those who are summoned for evidence are afflicted with very serious annoyances. Wherefore, taking counsel for the security of our provinces, we provide remedies of this character, that an accuser indeed may not entirely be repulsed from court, but whoever believes that he can add proofs to his charges may have the free opporunity to approach a judge and may reveal the defendant by clear evidence of the offenses, so that according to the nature of the deeds suitable punishment may be inflicted on the person who is convicted. But if he is not at all able to establish those charges which he makes he shall know that he must be subjected to a very severe sentence.
3) To be sure, if anyone charges someone with the crime of treason, since the accusation of such a kind not at all protects anyone by the privilege of any high rank from a very strict inquisition, he shall know that he also must be subject to torture if he is not able to establish his accusation by other clear evidences and proofs, since in the case of the person who is detected in this temerity this fact properly shall be elicited also by torture, namely, by whose advice and instigation it appears that he entered upon the accusation, so that punishment from all persons who are accessory to so great a deed can be exacted.
4) Moreover, it is known to all how often an opportunity also to approach a judge has been denied to informers not only by the statutes of our parents, but also by our ordinances, since a hearing must not be granted to persons of this kind, because indeed they must be subjected to punishment in accordance with the daring of such great wickedness.
5) Also in the case of slaves or of freedmen who attempt to accuse or to report their masters or their patrons we decree that the law according to the statute of the ancient law also must be observed, namely, that, to be sure, the declaration of such atrocious audacity shall be repressed immediately in the inception of its commission itself by the judge's decision, and, after a hearing has been denied, whoever proceeds to the desperate boldness of this kind shall offer, affixed to a gibbet, an example to all others, lest anyone of like audacity should appear in the future.
6) To be sure, that everywhere counsel may be taken for the security of innocent persons, it is our pleasure that defamatory informations shall not be accepted. And if anyone discovers these displayed anonymously, he shall be bound to remove them immediately and to tear them in pieces or to consume them by fire. And in these cases it shall be proper for the judges to take note of such a kind that, if perchance such information is brought to them, they shall direct it to be burned by fire, since a writing of such kind properly shall be removed completely from a judge's hearing, but an investigation shall remain against those persons who dare to display information of such a sort, that, when discovered, they shall be subjected to the due punishments of their temerity.
7) Accordingly, we have written about all these matters not only to our prefects but also to the governors and the treasurer and the master of our private estate, by whose other copy, when our edict has been published, it is declared most fully what kind of law and statute it contains.
8) Publicly posted January I in the consulship of Volusianus and Annianus.
(iii) Constantine's letter to Palestine [319-320]
P.Lond. III 878, Fragment of Constantine's letter to Palestine, corresponding to Vita Constantini 2. 23.
https://papyri.info/ddbdp/sb;6;9218
(Eusebius) The latter of these I think it well to insert here as connected with my present subject, in order on the one hand that a copy of this document may be recorded as matter of history, and thus preserved to posterity, and on the other that it may serve to confirm the truth of my present narrative. It is taken from an authentic copy of the imperial statute in my own possession and the signature in the emperor's own handwriting attaches as it were the impress of truth to the statement I have made.
"Victor Constantinus, Maximus Augustus, to the inhabitants of the province of Palestine.
"To all who entertain just and sound sentiments respecting the character of the Supreme Being, it has long been most clearly evident, and beyond the possibility of doubt, how vast a difference there has ever been between those who maintain a careful observance of the hallowed duties of the Christian religion, and those who treat this religion with hostility or contempt. But at this present time, we may see by still more manifest proofs, and still more decisive instances, both how unreasonable it were to question this truth, and how mighty is the power of the Supreme God: since it appears that they who faithfully observe His holy laws, and shrink from the transgression of His commandments, are rewarded with abundant blessings, and are endued with well-grounded hope as well as ample power for the accomplishment of their undertakings. On the other hand, they who have cherished impious sentiments have experienced results corresponding to their evil choice. For how is it to be expected that any blessing would be obtained by one who neither desired to acknowledge nor duly to worship that God who is the source of all blessing? Indeed, facts themselves are a confirmation of what I say."
"Victor Constantinus, Maximus Augustus, to the inhabitants of the province of Palestine.
"To all who entertain just and sound sentiments respecting the character of the Supreme Being, it has long been most clearly evident, and beyond the possibility of doubt, how vast a difference there has ever been between those who maintain a careful observance of the hallowed duties of the Christian religion, and those who treat this religion with hostility or contempt. But at this present time, we may see by still more manifest proofs, and still more decisive instances, both how unreasonable it were to question this truth, and how mighty is the power of the Supreme God: since it appears that they who faithfully observe His holy laws, and shrink from the transgression of His commandments, are rewarded with abundant blessings, and are endued with well-grounded hope as well as ample power for the accomplishment of their undertakings. On the other hand, they who have cherished impious sentiments have experienced results corresponding to their evil choice. For how is it to be expected that any blessing would be obtained by one who neither desired to acknowledge nor duly to worship that God who is the source of all blessing? Indeed, facts themselves are a confirmation of what I say."