Page 167 - Envoys and Political Communication in the Late Antique West 411 - 533

The saint as envoy: bishops’ Lives

The two embassy accounts in Vita Orientii do notform partof an
articulated structure as the equivalent narratives in Vita Germani do. The
Vita of Orientius is more episodic; there are no temporal connectives
between the episodes, and the only internal indicator of time is the state-
ment, opening the embassy to Aetius and Litorius, that Orientius ‘had
led a long life in the world before the Lord’. 104 The two embassy ac-
counts, however, comprise most of the length of the short Vita, and are
the most developed episodes. Moreover, the author’s general praises of
Orientius (§ 4) stress his role as a securer of peace and effective intercessor,
alongside his pastoral duties and success as an exorcist. Labor, Constantius’
favoured term in describing Germanus, is used repetitively in this eulogy:
‘Orientius, this blessed pontifex worthy of God, was greatly needed not
only for his preaching, and besides for the liberation of his homeland,
but he also liberated the bodies of many besieged by demons...In his
time, and by his labour, peace and security, for which he laboured greatly,
entered the world.’ 105 Orientius was ‘salvation to both his citizens and to
foreigners’. 106
Orientius’ embassy to Aetius and Litorius contains echoes of Ger-
manus’ confrontation with Goar: 107 the advanced age of the bishop is
stressed at the outset of the journey; he meets an army on its march
to the conflict he seeks to prevent; his appeal is rejected (by Litorius);
when it is heeded (by Aetius), the army leader dismounts. The second
embassy, to the court of the Gothic king, contains motifs more distinctly
drawn from two scenes in Sulpicius’ Vita Martini and Dialogi concern-
ing the emperor Magnus Maximus. 108 In Vita Martini, discussed above,
Maximus invites Martin to join his convivium;inthe Dialogi, Maximus
presses Martin to join in communion with the bishops involved in the
condemnation of Priscillian. Though the two episodes are described dif-
ferently by Sulpicius, in both cases, Martin is forced to compromise his
integrity to obtain the success of his petitions. Orientius, similarly, is
invited to the king’s convivium and given the opportunity to gain his re-
quest, provided he will partake of the meat dishes, which his frugal regular
diet excludes; the bishop compromises by blessing the food. Orientius is
threatened during the dinner by leading figures of the court; this seems to
be an awkward parallel to the tension of Martin’s refusal to pass the cup of
wine to the emperor Maximus. 109 The earlier scene of Orientius’ embassy

104
Vita Orientii, 3: Et cum praestante Domino vitam longam in seculo produceret.
105
Vita Orientii, 4: Beatus iste et Deo dignus pontifex Orientius,non solum in praedicatione,nec non et patriae
liberatione necessarius multum fuit,sed etiam multorum hominum obsessa a daemonibus corpora liberavit . . .
Eius temporibus,eo laborante pax et securitas,pro qua multum laboravit,in orbem terrae introivit.
106 107
Vita Orientii, 6: civibus salus et externis. Constantius, Vita Germani, 28.
108 109
Sulpicius, Vita Martini, 20; Dialogi iii, 11–14. Vita Martini, 20.
141