SOURCE: Hunt, E. D. “Christians and Christianity in Ammianus Marcellinus.” Classical Quarterly n.s. 35, no. 1 (1985): 186-200.

In the following essay, Hunt discusses Ammianus's attitudes toward Christianity and Christians.

Ammianus Marcellinus, by common consent the last great historian of Rome, rounds off his obituary notice of the emperor Constantius II (d. 361) with the following observation:

The plain simplicity of Christianity he obscured by an old woman's superstition; by intricate investigation instead of seriously trying to reconcile, he stirred up very many disputes, and as these spread widely he nourished them with arguments about words; with the result that crowds of bishops rushed hither and thither by means of public mounts on their way to synods (as they call them), and while he tried to make all their worship conform to his own will, he cut the sinews of the public transport service.¹

This is a perceptive judgement of the...