The "Christianos Graffito" discovered in Pompeii (1862)

[Peter Kirby]

Could someone being mentioned, whether gladiator performer or love sick slave, have been named or at least given a promotional name resembling Christos (anointed victor)

As spin would often inform us, this was not actual usage here ("anointed"). The meaning of the word christos, where it was used, is "to be rubbed on, used as ointment or salve" (i.e., only the first definition in the LSJ) except where it is informed by religious tradition and the Septuagint translation. The qualification "where it was used" is not to be ignored.

Greek of this period had different verbs (ἀλείφω, perhaps μυρίζω) that were commonly used for anointing. The fourth century writer Lactantius, for example, is explicitly aware of the verb not being in common use when people want to speak of anointing (Divine Institutes 4.7):

The ancient Greeks used the word khríesthai for being anointed (nowadays they say aleíphesthai), as the following line of Homer indicates: ‘When the servant girls had washed them and anointed them with oil;’

Martijn is therefore able to point out how the associated verb ("χρίω") isn't often used in the gospels (emphasis and "from:" notes are mine):

Matt 6:17 But [when] you fast, anoint (ἄλειψαί [from: ἀλείφω]) your head and wash your face.
Mark 6:13 They also drove out many demons and healed many of the sick, anointing (ἤλειφον [from: ἀλείφω]) [them] with oil.
Mark 14:8 She has done what she could to anoint (μυρίσαι [from: μυρίζω]) My body in advance of [My] burial.
Mark 16:1 When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the [mother] of James, and Salome bought spices so they could go [and] anoint (ἀλείψωσιν [from: ἀλείφω]) [Jesus’ body].
Luke 4:18 “[The] Spirit of [the] Lord [is] on Me, because He has anointed (ἔχρισέν [from: χρίω]) Me to preach good news to [the] poor. He has sent Me to proclaim deliverance to [the] captives and recovery of sight to [the] blind, to release [the] oppressed.
Luke 7:38 [As] she stood behind Him at His feet weeping, she began to wet His feet with [her] tears and wipe [them] with her hair. Then she kissed His feet and anointed (ἤλειφεν [from: ἀλείφω]) [them] with the perfume.
Luke 7:46 You did not anoint (ἤλειψας [from: ἀλείφω]) My head with oil, but she has anointed (ἤλειψεν [from: ἀλείφω]) My feet with perfume.
John 9:11 He answered, ‘The man they call Jesus made [some] mud and anointed (ἐπέχρισέν [from: ἐπιχρίω]) my eyes, and He told me to go to Siloam and wash. So I went and washed [and] received my sight.’
John 11:2 ( - Mary, whose brother Lazarus was sick, would [later] anoint (ἀλείψασα [from: ἀλείφω]) the Lord with perfume and wipe His feet with her hair.)
John 12:3 Then Mary took about a pint of expensive perfume, made of pure nard, [and] she anointed (ἤλειψεν [from: ἀλείφω]) Jesus’ feet and wiped [them] with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.

Linssen, Martijn. Gospels, Epistles, Old Testament: The order of books according to Jesus Chri st (p. 32). Kindle Edition.

For a count of (referencing "middle Liddell"):

ἀλείφω (x8 words or x7 verses)

I. [select] to anoint with oil, oil the skin, as was done after bathing, or before gymnastic exercises, the Act. referring to the act of another, Mid. to oneself, Il.; often with λίπα added (v. λίπα):— metaph. to prepare as if for gymnastics, to stimulate, Plat., etc.
II. [select] like ἐπαλείφω, to plaster, οὔατα ἀλεῖψαι to stop up the ears, Od.

μυρίζω (x1, Mark 14:8)

to rub with ointment or unguent, anoint, Ar.:—Pass., μεμυρισμένοι τὸ σῶμα having the body anointed, Hdt.

ἐπιχρίω (x1, John 9:11)

1. [select] to anoint, besmear, Od.:—Mid. to anoint oneself, id=Od.
2. [select] to plaster over, τι ἐπί τι NTest.; τινί with a thing, Luc.

χρίω (x1, Luke 4:18, quoting LXX Isaiah 61:1)

χρίω
I. [select] to touch on the surface: to rub or anoint with scented unguents, Hom.; λόεον καὶ χρῖον ἐλαίωι Od.; πέπλον χρ. to infect with poison, Soph.; metaph., ἱμέρωι χρίσασ᾽ οἰστόν Eur.:—Mid. to anoint oneself, Od., Hes.: c. acc. rei, χρίεσθαι ἰούς to anoint (i. e. poison) one's arrows, Od.:—Pass., χρίεσθαι ὑπὸ τοῦ ἡλίου, of a dead body left exposed to the sun, Hdt.
II. [select] to rub over with colour: Pass. to be coloured, id=Hdt.:—Mid., χρίεσθαι τὰ σώματα to smear their bodies, Xen.
III. [select] to wound on the surface, prick, sting, Aesch.:—Pass., ὀξυστόμωι μύωπι χρισθεῖσ᾽ id=Xen.

A quick search of Diogenes shows χρίω was common in the corpus of Hippocrates and Dioscorides, while ἐπιχρίω was common in medical authors such as Galen. So even where the word χρίω was in use, it has a different set of meanings and connotations than what is conjured up by "anoint" (ἀλείφω). Indeed we even have an ancient definition that pops up here in my search, commenting on Homer:

Apion Gramm. (c. A.D. 1), Fragmenta de glossis Homericis (1152: 003)
“”Über die homerischen Glossen Apions””, Ed. Ludwich, A.; Philologus 74 (1917) 209–247; 75 (1919) 95–103.
Volume 74, page 216, line 5
<ἀλεῖψαι> βʹ· τό τε χρῖσαι ἐλαίῳ (Σ 350).

Here the verb ἀλεῖψαι (i.e. "anoint") is defined as to χρῖσαι (i.e. "rub") ἐλαίῳ (i.e. "oil"). And here is the LSJ:

A. [select] “χρῖον” Od.4.252, also “χρίεσκε” A.R.4.871: fut. “χρίσω” E.Med.789: aor. “ἔχρι_σα” Od.10.364, etc., Ep. “χρῖσα” Il.16.680, Od.4.49: pf. “κέχρι_κα” LXX 1 Ki.10.1, al.:—Med., fut. “χρίσομαι” Od.6.220: aor. part. χρι_σάμενος ib.96, Hes.Op.523, etc.:—Pass., fut. “χρισθήσομαι” LXXEx.30.32: aor. “ἐχρίσθην” A.Pr.675, Achae.10: pf. “κέχρι_μαι” Hdt.4.189,195, Magnes 3, etc., later “κέχρισμαι” LXX 2 Ki. 5.17: plpf. ἐκέχριστο f. l. in X.Cyr.7.1.2; 3pl. “ἐκέχριντο” Callix.2. [Even in pres. and impf. ι is long, Od.21.179 (ἐπι-χρι_οντες), Il.23.186, S.Tr.675, etc.; χρι^ει only in late Poets, as AP6.275 (Noss.): in fut. and all other tenses ι_ without exception, whence the proper accent. is χρῖσαι, κεχρῖσθαι, χρῖσμα, etc.:—touch the surface of a body slightly, esp. of the human body, graze, hence,
I. [select] rub, anoint with scented unguents or oil, as was done after bathing, freq. in Hom., “λόεον καὶ χρῖον ἐλαίῳ” Od.4.252; “ἔχρισεν λίπ᾽ ἐλαίῳ” 3.466; “λοέσσαι τε χρῖσαί τε” 19.320; of a dead body, “χρῖεν ἐλαίῳ” Il.23.186; anoint a suppliant, Berl.Sitzb.1927.170 (Cyrene); πέπλον χ. rub or infect with poison, S.Tr.675, cf. 689,832 (lyr.): metaph., “ἱμέρῳ χρίσασ᾽ οἰστόν” E.Med.634 (lyr.); “οὐ μέλανι, ἀλλὰ θανάτῳ χ. τὸν κάλαμον” Plu.2.841e:—Med., anoint oneself, Od.6.96; “κάλλεϊ ἀμβροσίῳ οἵῳ . . Κυθέρεια χρίεται” 18.194, cf. Hes.Op.523; “ἐλαίῳ” Gal.6.417; “ἐκ φαρμάκου” Luc. Asin.13: c. acc. rei, ἰοὺς χρίεσθαι anoint (i. e. poison) one's arrows, Od.1.262:—Pass., “χρίεσθαι ὑπὸ τοῦ ἡλίου” Hdt.3.124; βακκάριδι κεχριμένος Magnes l. c.; “συκαμίνῳ τὰς γνάθους κεχριμέναι” Eub.98.3: metaph., “Σοφοκλέους τοῦ μέλιτι κεχριμένου” Ar.Fr.581.
2. [select] in LXX, anoint in token of consecration, “χ. τινὰ εἰς βασιλέα” 4 Ki.9.3; “εἰς ἄρχοντα” 1 Ki.10.1; “εἰς προφήτην” 3 Ki.19.16; also “χ. τινὰ τοῦ βασιλεύειν” Jd.9.15: c. dupl. acc., “χ. τινὰ ἔλαιον” Ep.Heb.1.9.
II. [select] wash with colour, coat, “αἰγέαι κεχριμέναι ἐρευθεδάνῳ” Hdt.4.189; πίσσῃ ib.195, cf. Inscr.Délos442A188 (ii B. C.); “ἀσφάλτῳ” X.Cyr.7.5.22 (Pass.); “στοάν” Supp.Epigr.4.268 (Panamara, ii A. D.):—Med., τὸ σῶμα μίλτῳ χρίονται smear their bodies, Hdt.4.191.
III. [select] wound on the surface, puncture, prick, sting, of the gadfly in A.Pr.566,597, 880 (all lyr.):—Pass., ὀξυστόμῳ μύωπι χρισθεῖσ᾽ ib.675.

What can be seen by the definitions in the LSJ and in this definition of the comment on Homer is that χρίω ("smear") is a wide-ranging verb that implies less than a more-specific sense of anointing: you can "rub" or "smear" clothing or arrows with poison, you can smear walls with paint, you can rub bodies with colored dye, you can rub in a medical salve or treatment, etc. That's why it's not redundant for the definition of "anoint" (ἀλείφω) to specify "with oil": χρῖσαι ἐλαίῳ. The verb χρίω ("rub" or "smear" or, as the LSJ puts it, "touch the surface of a body slightly, esp. of the human body, graze") didn't carry the same sense of anointing that the word ἀλείφω for example did.

Of course, however, religious texts (in the Jewish/Christian tradition) were influenced by the usage of the Septuagint.

[Peter Kirby]

If what we are talking about here are common graffiti, they could say anything. Folks proclaim the unrequited love for this or that slave, others mock those persons for obsessing about someone who has paid no attention to them in real life.

Good observation. Yes, and over 11,000 graffiti are known from Pompeii and Herculaneum. There are all kinds of examples.

[mbuckley3]

What can be seen by the definitions in the LSJ and in this definition of the comment on Homer is that χρίω ("smear") is a wide-ranging verb that implies less than a more-specific sense of anointing: you can "rub" or "smear" clothing or arrows with poison, you can smear walls with paint, you can rub bodies with colored dye, you can rub in a medical salve or treatment, etc. That's why it's not redundant for the definition of "anoint" (ἀλείφω) to specify "with oil": χρῖσαι ἐλαίῳ. The verb χρίω ("rub" or "smear" or, as the LSJ puts it, "touch the surface of a body slightly, esp. of the human body, graze") didn't carry the same sense of anointing that the word ἀλείφω for example did.

Of course, however, religious texts (in the Jewish/Christian tradition) were influenced by the usage of the Septuagint.

Minor supplementary confirmation of this, from a different angle, comes with the word νεοχριστος.

If asked to translate it, we might 'automatically" suggest 'newly anointed", referring to the newly baptised. While 'correct', the first instance of this usage in the lexica is in a C8 text attributed to John of Damascus.

But in the C2 Appian, Civil Wars 1.8.74, we find this : Κατλος δ'εν οικηματι νεοχριστω τε και ετι υγρω καιων ανθρακας εκων απεπνιγη/"Catulus suffocated himself with burning charcoal in a chamber newly plastered and still moist." After all, a χριστης is a 'plasterer'.

[DCHindley]

For those who pay attention to those pesky details, here is a updated version of something I created in pre-Unicode days (original used one of the two ASCII transliteration schemes from the 1990s), updated to Unicode (UTF-8).

I titled this revision

ΧΡΊΩ (Chriō), ΧΡΙΣΤὸΣ (Chrístos), ΧΡῖΣΜΑ (Chrîsma)

Χρίω (khriō) verb (to touch on the surface: to rub or anoint)

LXX (Pentateuch):
• Exod. 28:41; 29:2, 7, 29, 36; 30:26, 30, 32; 40:9f, 13;
• Lev. 4:3; 6:13; 7:36; 8:11f; 16:32;
• Num. 6:15; 7:1, 10, 84, 88; 35:25;
• Deut. 28:40;
OG:
• Jdg. 9:8, 15;
• 1 Sam. 9:16; 10:1; 11:15; 15:1, 17; 16:3, 12f;
• 2 Sam. 1:21; 2:4, 7; 5:3, 17; 12:7; 19:11;
• 1 Ki. 1:34, 39, 45; 5:15; 19:15f;
• 2 Ki. 9:3, 6, 12; 11:12; 23:30;
• 1 Chr. 11:3; 14:8; 29:22;
• 2 Chr. 23:11; 36:1;
• Jdt. 10:3;
• Ps. 26:1; 44:8; 88:21; 151:4;
• Sir. 45:15; 46:13; 48:8;
• Hos. 8:10;
• Amos 6:6;
• Isa. 25:6; 61:1;
• Jer. 22:14;
• Ezek. 16:9; 43:3;
• Dan-Theodotion 9:24

Josephus:
• Ant. 2:220 (to daub Moses' ark of bulrushes with slime);
• 3:198 (to anoint a priest);
• 4:200 (to white over with mortar);
• 6:83 (to anoint Saul with holy oil),
• 6:157 (to anoint a son of Jesse to be the Israelite king in place of Saul),
• 6:159 (to anoint a specific youth as above);
• 7:357 (the high priest and Nathan the prophet anoint Solomon with oil as king David's designated successor),
• 7:382 (repeat of Solomon's anointing with oil after David's death);
• 9:106 (a disciple of Elisha the prophet is given holy oil to anoint Jehu as king),
• 9:149 (7 yr old Jehoash is anointed king by the high priest Jehoiada);
• 19:239 (Agrippa the Jew anoints his head with oil before visiting the Roman Senate to mediate Claudius' appointment as emperor)

Perseus Project:
• Aeschylus: Prometheus Bound (4)
• Apollodorus: Library and Epitome (5)
• Apollonius Rhodius: Argonautica (1)
• Appian: The Foreign Wars (1)
• Aretaeus: The Cappadocian (15)
• Callimachus: Hymns and Epigrams (2)
• Diodorus Siculus: Library (1)
• Diogenes Laertius: Lives of Eminent Philosophers (1)
• Euripides: Medea (2)
• Herodotus: The Histories (6)
• Hesiod: Works and Days (1)
• Hippocrates: De diaeta in morbis acutis (3)
• Homer: Iliad (4), Odyssey (16)
• Homeric Hymns (2)
• Pausanias: Description of Greece (3)
• Pindar: Odes (1)
• Plutarch: Agesilaus (1), Alexander (1), Aristides (1), Cimon (3), De Pythiae oraculis (1), Quaestiones Convivales (4), Quaestiones Naturales (1)
• Sophocles: Trachiniae (4)
• Strabo: Geography (3)
• Theocritus: Idylls (1)
• Xenophon: Anabasis (2), Cyropaedia (2), Minor Works (2), Works on Socrates (2)

Χριστὸς (khrístos) noun masculine (to be rubbed on, of persons, anointed)

LXX (Pentateuch):
• Lev. 4:5, 16; 6:15; 21:10, 12;
OG:
• 1 Sam. 2:10, 35; 12:3, 5; 16:6; 24:7, 11; 26:9, 11, 16, 23;
• 2 Sam. 1:14, 16; 2:5; 19:22; 22:51; 23:1;
• 1 Chr. 16:22;
• 2 Chr. 6:42; 22:7;
• 2 Ma. 1:10;
• Ps. 2:2; 17:51; 19:7; 27:8; 83:10; 88:39, 52; 104:15; 131:10, 17;
• Odes 3:10; 4:13; 14:14, 27;
• Sir. 46:19;
• Ps. Sol. 17:32; 18:1, 5, 7;
• Amos 4:13;
• Hab. 3:13;
• Isa. 45:1;
• Lam. 4:20;
• Dan-OG 9:26;
• Dan-Theodotion 9:25

Josephus:
• Ant. 8:137 (roof of Solomon’s temple anointed with plaster);
• 18:63 (called Christ);
• 20:200 (called Christ)

Perseus Project:
• Aeschylus: Prometheus Bound (1, ointment)
• Euripides: Hippolytus (1, ointment)

Χρῖσμᾰ (khrîsma) neuter noun third declension (anything smeared on)

LXX (Pentateuch):
• Exod. 29:7; 30:25; 35:12, 19; 40:9, 15;
OG:
• Sir. 38:30;
• Dan-OG 9:26;
• Dan-Theodotion 9:26

Josephus:
• Ant. 3:197 (priests anointed with a sweet ointment)

Perseus Project:
• Aretaeus: The Cappadocian (4)
• Theophrastus: Characters (1)

This should give most anyone with normal intelligence the leads to figure out how these words were used in the Pentateuch (LXX) and Old Greek (OG) translations of Judean scriptures (just see how they are translated by various versions), and I've glossed the passages from Josephus to clue you in on what the context was, and use in non-Christian writers (you'll have to look these up I'm afraid).

If this is too long a post, I have also saved a copy as a three column table, broken down with a row each for LXX, OG, Josephus & Perseus Project (pagan) Greek authors. See attached:

(Hindley, David C) 'ΧΡΊΩ (Khriō), ΧΡΙΣΤὸΣ (Khrístos), ΧΡῖΣΜΑ (Khrîsma)' (3-10-2024).pdf

(124.54 KiB) Downloaded 13 times

DCH

[Leucius Charinus]

(1) “a figment of pious imagination”

(2) 'accusations of fraud - the original eyewitnesses invented
the graffito and that “in fact, probably no one ever saw it!”

The above isn't critical and rational; it's a statement of prejudices.

The prejudice is directed against efforts to masquerade a pious fraud as an authentic relic.

Using a description of what Mary Beard writes as "the criticism" loosely (emphasis added):

(1) “a figment of pious imagination”

The first is from the classical historian Mary Beard in "The Fires of Vesuvius: Pompeii Lost and Found" (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2010), 302. Here the criticism is described as '[simply -ed.] dismissing a Christian reading of the graffito as “a figment of pious imagination,” although typically without carefully engaging the full range of relevant evidence.' Elsewhere the author is described as "open to the possibility that Christians were in the city of Pompeii, but do not include the Christianos graffito as evidence". It might be added that Mary Beard has produced historical documentaries which include the martyrdom of Perpetua.

The whole comment from Mary Beard on the graffito can be read in a single sentence with no footnote:

Were there Christians in Pompeii? By 79 it is not impossible. But there is no firm evidence for their presence, except for an example of a common Roman word game. This is one of those clever, but almost meaningless, phrases which read exactly the same backwards and forwards. It also turns out to be (almost) an anagram of PATER NOSTER (‘OUR FATHER’) written twice over, as well as two sets of the letters A and O (like the Christian ‘Alpha and Omega’). Some of the later examples of the same game do seem to have Christian connections. This one may too ... or it may not. The charcoal graffito which was said to include the word ‘Christiani’, but faded almost instantly, is almost certainly a figment of pious imagination. There is stronger evidence for the presence of Jews. No synagogue has been unearthed. But there is at least one inscription in Hebrew, a few possible references to the Jewish bible, including the famous reference to Sodom and Gomorrah (p. 25), and a sprinkling of possibly Jewish names — not to mention that kosher garum (p. 24).

There is no "criticism" here, just mere claim. Wayment and Grey are certainly correct that Beard in this paragraph is "simply dismissing" and does so "typically" (which is not a slight against Beard but simply an observation about how it is fairly typical that reactions to the graffito proceed this way) "without carefully engaging the full range of relevant evidence." Whatever credibility Beard may have otherwise and whatever Beard may have been thinking about when writing this claim, speculating about Beard's authority and inner thoughts is unproductive. It's simply a fact that Beard's reference does not advance the discussion.

It's perhaps notable that Jaimie Gunderson, like Wayment and Grey, attempts to improve the sensibility of Mary Beard's one sentence comment by interpreting it more specifically (Inscribing Pompeii: A Reevaluation of the Jewish Epigraphic Data, p. 76):

Yet some recent scholars, including Mary Beard, have entirely dismissed the presence of the word “Christians” in the inscription as “almost certainly a figment of pious imagination.”

What Mary Beard said is not that specific but rather:

The charcoal graffito which was said to include the word ‘Christiani’, but faded almost instantly, is almost certainly a figment of pious imagination.

Where the subject of the sentence is the "charcoal graffito," where the account of the text of the graffito is that of Kiessling's "Christiani" (not mentioning either Fiorelli or Minervini), and where the comment emphasizes one supposed fact: that it "faded almost instantly" (which is not a fact at all).

In short, Mary Beard has been interpreted too charitably. Beard makes a claim similar to the one made by Moorman (who alleges that "no one ever saw it!"), without evidence, and in a way that is consistent with not having a full command of the relevant evidence.

Full command of the evidence? The evidence consists of three 1862 sketches, the subject of which was a 1st century charcoal Latin graffito which quickly vanished. The only evidence we have left are these three sketches. Various transcriptions and translations of the three sketches of graffito have been put forward by scholars. I did include a timeline in the OP. Almost all translations of these sketches agree that the graffito included the word "Christianos". What does this secondary evidence enable us to say with any degree of certainty?

You say:

a fairly cautious conclusion regarding the the inscription having the word 'Christianos' here can be reached.

OTOH Mary Beard says

"The charcoal graffito which was said to include the word ‘Christiani’, but faded almost instantly, is almost certainly a figment of pious imagination.".

To put it simply Beard is (IMHO) saying the graffito is a pious fraud. The other detractor Moormann, who was cited in your sources, as a critic, would (IMO) completely agree.

Beard and Moorman are clearly prejudiced against pious frauds being classified, cautiously or otherwise, as authentic and legitimate. And so they should be. Pious frauds are frauds. This is quite obviously how they both assess the (full command of the relevant) evidence.


What about photography?

As noted in the OP the historical integrity of the Pompeii Christianus graffito would have increased IMO had someone taken a photograph of it. Nine years before Giulio Minervini sketched the signs appearing on the wall, he reported in the December 1853 issue of the Bullettino Archeologico Napoletano, "that the court had acquired a camera and engaged the services of a photographer."

Why didn't Giulio Minervini bring a camera and a photographer with him to the site, and photograph the evidence rather than draw it?

p.53

Official resolve to initiate comprehensive photographic documentation of Pompeian antiquities was made by the director of the Royal Museum in Naples and superintendent of excavations, the Principe di San Giorgio, Domenico Spinelli, at more or less the same time that strictly archaeological photography and photographic publications were being pursued in other parts of the Mediterranean. "Most interesting news," Giulio Minervini reacted in the December 1853 issue of the Bullettino Archeologico Napoletano, reporting that the court had acquired a camera and engaged the services of a photographer named Campanella. For Minervini, recording architectural remains during stratigraphic excavation and rescuing paintings from inevitable destruction were the main advantages of these preziosi disegni.


ANTIQUITY & PHOTOGRAPHY

This publication is issued in connection with the exhibition Antiquity & Photography: Early Views of Ancient Mediterranean Sites held at the Getty Villa , Malibu, winter and spring of 2006. This inaugural exhibition was sponsored by Merrill Lynch. The Getty Villa Council generously supported the guest curators and preparation of the essays.

© 2005 J. Paul Getty Trust

https://www.getty.edu/publications/reso ... 368055.pdf

[Leucius Charinus]

2) The involvement of the papal archeologist Giovanni Battista de Rossi, even at arm's length, rings all sorts of warning bells for me.

3) The involvement of Pope Pius IX who "moved beyond collecting [Christian relics] by appointing a commission - "Commissione de archaelogia sacra" - that would be responsible for all early Christian remains" also rings all sorts of warning bells.

The above isn't critical and rational; it's a statement of prejudices.

The Early Modern Invention of Late Antique Rome
Nicola Denzey Lewis
Cambridge University Press, 9/3/2020
EAN 9781108471893, ISBN10: 1108471897


In The Early Modern Invention of Late Antique Rome, Nicola Denzey Lewis challenges the common understanding of late antique Christianity as dominated by the Cult of Saints. Popularized by historian Peter Brown, the Cult of the Saints presupposes that a 'corporeal turn' in the 4th century CE initiated a new sense of the body (even the corpse or bone) as holy.

Denzey Lewis argues that although present elsewhere in the late Roman Empire, no such 'corporeal turn' happened in Rome until the early modern period. The prevailing assumption that it did was fostered by the apologetic concerns of early modern Catholic scholars, as well as contemporary attitudes towards death, antiquity, and the survival of the Church against secularism. Denzey Lewis delves deeply into the world of Roman late antique Christianity, exploring how and why it differed from the set of practices and beliefs we have come to think flourished in this crucial age of Christianization.

1. The Reinventio of the Hidden City
2. Rewiring the Sacred Circuit (Roma Sancta Renovata)
3. Remains to be Seen (or, 'on the Holy Corpse')
4. Peter's Bones
5. De Rossi's Deception- Crafting the Crypt of the Popes
6. Raising Late Antique Jews from the Valley of Dry Bones
7. Disposing with Depositio (Ad Sanctos)
8. Inventing Christian Rome.

5. - De Rossi’s Deception: Crafting the Crypt of the Popes
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 August 2020

Nicola Denzey Lewis

Summary

The Catacombs of Callixtus’s Crypt of the Popes bear testimony to the antiquity of Rome’s apostolic past, containing the burials of a succession of popes from the second and third centuries. Upon close examination, however, the site is not as it seems. Far from being an authentic, untouched papal burial site since the third century, I argue in Chapter 5 that the Crypt of the Popes is a (re)constructed mnemotopia for the benefit of a Catholic audience – engineered by the famed Roman “sacred archaeologist” Giovanni Battista De Rossi (1822–1894).

https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/ab ... C5F81E0AB8

PREVIEWS: https://books.google.com.au/books?id=QJ ... ia&f=false

REVIEW:

Chapter Four provides a fascinating illustration of the interwoven and layered process of creating historical narratives. This chapter, devoted to Peter’s bones could certainly expand into its own book. As Denzey Lewis explains, no evidence of Peter’s burial remains, and we may never be able to find them. But many still fervently argue that the literal body of the martyred saint lies under St. Peter’s Basilica. The invention of this sacred space first appears during the tenure of Pope Damasus (366-384), who was interested in ‘another Peter,’ the Peter who founded of the papacy. For him, Peter as a martyr and as the founder of Christianity in Rome was no longer enough.

Until the fourth century, Denzey Lewis suggests that “the automatic connections we so often make between corporeal relics and the establishment of sacred space” (p.301) are not as apparent as we think. Tombs and catacombs were not ‘sacred space’ in late antiquity, although they were deliberately presented as such from the Counter-Reformation until the present. The story of Peter’s tomb would thus be proof of what Denzey Lewis suggests earlier in the book: sacred spaces were identified on the basis of stories, not vice versa. In her words: “first story, then place” (p. 88). This confirms, she notes, scholar of religion Jonathan Z’s Smith’s famous dictum: “people are not placed; they bring place into being” (p.81).

But stories need somebody to tell them. What makes Denzey Lewis’ book unique is how she centers both the storytellers and their stories. There are the main actors on stage, two “impresarios” (p.219), who both contributed to making antique Rome a network of sacred space and a holy city. Pope Damasus is the first, for he lived in Rome and served as its bishop between 366 and 384 CE. The second key figure is Giovanni Battista De Rossi (1822-1894), the Italian archaeologist who inaugurated Christian archaeology some fifteen centuries later and who is universally regarded as the discoverer of Christian catacombs. As historians, we are often inclined to consider Damasus our object of study, while we would treat De Rossi as ‘one of us’. In this book, however, both are examined as objects worthy of study. De Rossi is treated first since he is responsible for the modern invention of late antique Rome, specifically, the idea that Rome is the extraordinary and unique example of a Christian city with intentional holy space. De Rossi’s efforts serve as the culmination of a process begun by Damasus (only partially successful) to transform burial spaces into holy places and the catacombs we all know. Through this work, Damasus sought to consolidate his power as a church leader. While Denzey acknowledges that Damasus was surely interested in inculcating “specific ‘memories’ at specific Christian sites” (p. 93), he was not “the first urban planner of late antique Rome” (p.92), as scholarly literature would lead one to believe.

In the nineteenth century, De Rossi established the direct relationship between burial sites and written sources. And his work was as ideologically driven as Damasus’s: both had an interest in organizing the topography of Rome into a network of sacred space. As Denzey Lewis shows, sacred history and sacred archaeology were united by de Rossi toward the same goal: “De Rossi and his fellow Catholics stood to gain considerable social capital by creating a collective, commemorative ritual that developed and perpetuated a new, Christian social memory” (p.219). In other words, De Rossi’s work is certainly important in terms of archaeology, but here Denzey Lewis makes an important distinction: De Rossi is the one who established the connection between physical spaces in Rome and the sacred spaces discussed in late antique writings. As she demonstrates, these links naturalized a sacred history, rendering it beyond scrutiny.

In the opening chapter of the book, Denzey Lewis poses the provocative question: how did Rome become holy? The answer, as we see by the end of this book, lies mainly in the logic behind the compilation of the sources rather than in the sources per se. In other words, historians need to study not just the historical data, but also, the imposition of different classifications on that data—especially those that have been unquestioned for centuries. Classifications are never objective, and Denzey Lewis illuminates how analysis must consider how such classifications came to be in the first place. As we read in the Introduction, “the genesis of Roma Sacra is revealed not in the ancient sources themselves, but in the way in which we are led to see it, refracted, as it is, through the lens of those who very much understood what was meant by ‘sacred Rome’” (p.29).

https://www.ancientjewreview.com/read/2 ... tique-rome

Nicola Denzey Lewis. The Early Modern Invention of Late Antique Rome. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020.

[Leucius Charinus]

4) All other epigraphic and physical manuscript evidence related to the nation of the Christians appears in the 3rd century with nothing from the first two centuries other than this "discovery" from the 1st century which within days disappeared under the Pompeii rainstorms.

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If the question is instead about the existence of Christians in the first century (instead of just about the distribution of the physical evidence), it can be noted that the presence of Christians in the first century can easily be seen to be likely for other reasons, such as the reference from Suetonius to the punishment of Christians for the fire at Rome in the mid first century. This is consistent with the reference in 1 Peter 4:16 to suffering "as a Christian," something also seen in the letters of Pliny. These references all have "Christian" being the name given by those outside the group, not least in the context of conflicts with other groups (sometimes 'persecution'). The name "Christian" itself is a Latin-form ending (-ianus) on the Greek word "Christ," which is consistent with a historical context of the metropolitan city of Rome where Greek speakers mingled with a Latin public. It would be reasonable to suggest that the name "Christian" (Suetonius) or "Chrestian" (Tacitus) was already being used in Rome during the time of the punishment inflicted by Nero on the same. This is what the relevant historical evidence speaks to, in any event.

In a separate thread the Non-Christian Literary Witnesses to the Historicity of Early Christians - by century from the 1st to the 4th - has been gathered together and examined.

SUMMARY HERE: viewtopic.php?p=144923#p144923

The Christian references in Pliny the Younger Ep 10:97, Emperor Trajan - rescript, Tacitus - Annals 15:44, Suetonius - (Christians punished; Nero 16) and other sources such as Josephus, are not universally accepted as authentic.

The question about the existence of Christians in the first century appears to me to be an open one. I can agree that this graffito should be included and weighed in the evaluation of an answer to this question.

The two papers that I linked show that some researchers have the integrity to move beyond old prejudices and to consider the evidence in a fair-minded way.

The two papers also cite other researchers who essentially class the evidence as an instance of pious fraud. Such an evaluation should not IMO be dismissed as "old prejudice" or not exhibiting "fair-mindedness". The fact remains (as outlined and argued in the above linked post, and elsewhere) that the church organisation as a political entity has engaged in pious forgery and historical fraud through the centuries. This historical fact should not be swept under the carpet when evaluating the "Christianos Graffito" discovered in Pompeii (1862).