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On the Foundation of Constantinople: A Few Notes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

A. Alföldi
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Extract

The literary sources relating to the foundation of Constantinople can be evaluated afresh if the numismatic material is reconsidered. On this subject O. Voetter, J. Maurice, and O. Seeck have already done valuable work; yet it would bear further study.

Everyone knows the little bronze coins struck on the occasion of the foundation of Constantinople on 11th May, 330, one type of which commemorates Constantinople as the mistress of the seas, while another portrays the old capital, recalling the legend of its origin, with the wolf and twins. The significance of these twin types can be grasped better in a still larger issue struck at the same time. Maurice classed these coins in the larger issue which bear the bust of Rome as having been struck at Rome, and those bearing that of Constantinople as having been struck in the latter city; and this incorrect classification has obscured the parallelism of the type, which was of great importance for imperial propaganda. It is clear that both groups were struck at Rome in the same issue.

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Type
Papers Presented to N. H. Baynes
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The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 37 , Issue 1-2 , November 1947 , pp. 10 - 16
Copyright
Copyright © A. Alföldi 1947. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 I must express the best of thanks to Mr. A. J. N. Wilson, who helped me with the translation of this paper.

2 O. Voetter, Monatsblatt der numism. Gesellschaft in Wien no. 176, 1898, 188; no. 177, 199 ff.

3 J. Maurice, see note 5.

4 Seeck, O., Zeitsch.für Num. xxi, 1898, 61 ffGoogle Scholar.

5 Maurice, , Numismatique Constantinienne 1, 1908, 253Google Scholar, nos. V, VI, VII. Type VII is reproduced here on plate III, no. 5. The explanation of this type by Maurice is mistaken. We should look for the prototype of the allegorical composition in a Hellenistic terracotta of two girls at play lifting a third on their shoulders. This theme is intended to convey an impression of the gay prosperity of a Golden Age, of which Constantine is the bringer—just as the Panegyric of Nazarius expresses it: ‘placidam quippe rerum quietem et profundum urbi otium gentis perdomitae condiderunt. Vacat remissioribus animis delectamenta pacis adhibere.’ Cf. Optatius Porphyrianus V, 15 ff.

6 Op. cit. 2, 1911, 521 ff., nos. VI–VII.

7 For the mints of the medallions, see now Toynbee, J. M. C., Roman Medallions (Numismatic Studies no. 5, New York 1944), 48 ffGoogle Scholar.

8 Themist., Orat. IV, p. 69Google Scholar, 25 (Dindorf). Cf. Julian, , Orat. 1, 6Google Scholar (p. 18 Bidez). Seeck, O., Zeitschr. d. Sav.-St. für Rechtsgeschichte, rom. Abt. x, 1889, 196 ffGoogle Scholar. has already noted these passages (and others). See the detailed analyses of all the literary data in Preger, Th., Hermes XXXVI, 1901, 336 ffGoogle Scholar.

9 Themistius says that Constantine simultaneously invested his son with the purple and his city with a wall. Constantine II became Caesar on 13th November, 324, as a recently found inscription from Amiternum shows (Anibaldi, N. d. Scavi, 1936, 96); this cannot mean that the building of the city began exactly on the same day as J. Maurice (‘Les origines de Constantinople’, Recueil de Mémoires publié par la Société des Antiquaires de France à l' occasion de son centenaire 1904, p. 2) argues—and after him Otto Seeck (see below) and Piganiol, L'Empereur Constantin (1932), 162. Preger is more accurate (op. cit. 341): ‘wir müssen bedenken, dass es dem Rhetor mehr urn ein Wortspiel mit ἀμφιάЗειν als um eine genaue historische Angabe zu tun war’. Cf. Seeck, O., Rhein. Mus. LXIII, 1908, 275Google Scholar, and Geschichte des Untergangs der antiken Welt III2, 429—the complete literature for the problems of the foundation of Constantinople is to be found in Gerland, E., Byzantinisch-neugriech. Jahrbücher X, 1934, 104 ffGoogle Scholar. and E. Gren, Kleinasien und der Ostbalkan, 1941, 156 ff. I have not seen Bréhier, Louis, ‘Constantin et la fondation de Constantinople’, Revue historique CXIX, 1915, 1241 ffGoogle Scholar. and Lathoud, D., ‘La consécration et la dédicace de Constantinople,’ Echos d'Orient XXIII, 1924, 289 ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar, XXIV, 1925, 180 ff.

10 O. Voetter, op. cit., and J. Maurice, op. cit., and Num. Const. II, 1911, 482 ffGoogle Scholar.

11 Zosimus II, 30, 1.

12 Sozomen II, 3, 2 ff.

13 Zonaras XIII, 3, 1 ff. (= 3, pp. 13 ff., Büttner-Wobst).

14 Chron. pasch. ad a. 328 (p. 528 Bonn = Mon. Germ. Hist. auct. ant. IX, p. 233); Malal. XIII, 321; Zonaras XIII, 3, 28; Procop., Bell. Goth. 1, 15Google Scholar.

15 Zonaras XIII, 3, 25 (=3, p. 18, 8 Büttner-Wobst).

16 The female figure on the golden commemorative medals with the legend Pietas Augusti Nostri (J. M. C. Toynbee, op. cit., 183 and 196), is the schematic symbol for any city of the Empire (e.g. J. M. C. Toynbee, pl. VI, 2, VIII, 5–6, XXX, 3, XXV, 2, XXXVI), and not the special deity created later for the new capital.

17 Preger writes: ‘but, in spite of this fact, in my opinion it is not advisable to throw overboard the evidence of the Chronicon Paschale, for other indications point to the Emperors having reversed this policy.’

18 Maurice, J., ‘Les origines de Constantinople,’ 9.Google Scholar

19 Maurice, J., Num. Const. 11, 1911, 179 ffGoogle Scholar.

20 Seeck, O., Zeitschr. für Numismatik XXI, 1898, 22 ff.Google Scholar, 11.

21 Ibid. 2, 24; Maurice, J., Num. Const. 1, 237Google Scholar.

22 O. Seeck, ibid., p. 24; similarly J. Maurice, Num. Const. 1, 245, and J. M. C. Toynbee, op. cit., 116.

23 Cod. Theod. XIII, 5, 16 (6 February, A.D. 380): ‘Idem AAA. Corpori naviculariorum. Delatam vobis a divo Constantino et Juliano principibus aeternis equestris ordinis dignitatem nos firmamus.’ Compare the law of Valentinian 1, ib. VI, 37, 1: ‘Ad Mamertinum p(raefectum) p(raetori)o. Equites Romani, quos secundi gradus in urbe omnium optinere volumus dignitatem, ex indigenis Romanis et civibus eligantur, vel his peregrinis, quos corporatis non oportet adnecti. Et quia vacuos huiusmodi viros esse privilegiis non oportet, corporalium eos iniuriarum et prosecutionum formido non vexet, ab indictionibus quoque, quae senatorium ordinem manent, habebuntur immunes.’ A. Stein, Der römische Ritterstand (1927), 457 ff., did not perceive the meaning of these edicts; the new knights are not the noble youth. Sallet, A. v., Zeitschrift für Num. III, 1876, p. 129Google Scholar, and like him Karl Hönn (Konstantin der Grosse (1940), 150) thought that the Senators meant the Senate of Constantinople, but the connection between it and the Equites and Populus, as well as the chronology, excludes this.

24 Seeck, op. cit., 26. Maurice, J., Num. Const. 1, p. CXXXIVGoogle Scholar, gives the mistaken date of 325, but volume 11, 168 ff., states the correct date.

25 So Laqueur, Eusebius als Historiker seiner Zeit (1929) 195 ff. (following Eusebius, , Hist. Eccles. X, 10–24Google Scholar = Schwartz, p. 896).

26 O. Seeck, Geschichte des Untergangs der antiken Welt, III2, 425.

27 Zosimus 11, 29, 1 ff.; cf. the discussion of this argument by Philostorgius elucidated by Bidez, J., Byzantion, X, 1935, 413 ffGoogle Scholar.

28 Zosimus 11, 29, 5 and 30; Leo Gramm. p. 84, 19.

29 The instinctively made προσκύνησις of beasts before the numen of the Emperor is a well-known motive in panegyrical poetry. See O. Weinreich, Studien zu Martial (1928), 74 ff. But this is the first appearance of such a scene in plastic art—this type was completely misinterpreted by J. Maurice as portraying victory over paganism (Num. Const. 1, 246 ff.). Cf. also Opt. Porph., , Carmen IX, 31 ff.Google Scholar, and X, 33 ff.

30 Pisciculi, in F. Dölger 1939, 5.

31 O. Seeck, Gesch. d. Untergangs d. ant. Welt III2 426 f., and already Zeitschr.für Num. XXI, 1898, 60Google Scholar.

32 Friedländer, J., Zeitschr. für Num. III, 1879, 125 ff.Google Scholar; Schultze, V., Zeitschr. für Kirchengesch. VII, 1885, 356 ff.Google Scholar; Parisotti, A., Archivio della Soc. rom. di Storia patria XI, 1888, 143Google Scholar; J. Strzygowski, ‘Analecta Graeciensia’ (Festschrift zur 42. Versammlung deutscher Philologen v. Schulmänner 1893), 141 ff.; O. Seeck, Zeitschr. für Num., 1898, 64; J. Maurice, Num. Const. 1, p. CLI, 158, II, 520; Lathoud, D., Echos d'Orient XXIV, 1925, 183 ff.Google Scholar; Cesano, L., Studi di Numismatica 1, 1940, 69 ff.Google Scholar; Laffranchi, L., Numismatica VII, 1941Google Scholar, no. 2.

33 J. Maurice, op. cit., 11, 1911, 520, no. v =Fr. Gnecchi, I medaglioni romani, tav. 28, 11–13.

34 Preger, Th., Hermes XXXVI, 1901, 338 ffGoogle Scholar.