Page 258 - Envoys and Political Communication in the Late Antique West 411 - 533

Envoys and Political Communication,411–533

local political structures of both their provincial community and their
own church, bishops could benefit from the prestige attached to com-
pleting an embassy, especially to the imperial court; but they might also
well be wary of the potential for domestic intrigue developing during
any prolonged absence. 39
Palatine embassies comprised a wider range of representatives. Bishops
were used as envoys by courts, as by provincial bodies. In selecting clergy
for envoys, courts could choose to take into consideration the religious
heterodoxy prevalent throughout the West, by choosing priests adhering
to the confession, Nicene or Arian, of the recipient court. 40 In the en-
voy’s delivery, a shared creed between the principal and recipient could
41
be exploited in hope of winning favour. Yetcreed was notalways a de-
termining factor in the selection of envoys: the Arian Theoderic of Italy
chose to send to his co-religionist Gundobad the Nicene Epiphanius of
Pavia. 42 In addition to the bishops’ own eloquence or the respect that
their personal piety might command, rulers who dispatched clergy could
hope to exploit the status of their office; on rare occasions, this included
the bishops of Rome. Even such a senior dignitary was no guarantee
of success: three times, the Ostrogothic kings of Italy sent senior clergy
of Rome, two popes and one deacon who later also became pope, to
Justinian, each time in vain. 43 Though Justinian warmly received Pope
Agapitus, dispatched by Theodahad in 536 in the hope of forestalling the
approaching naval forces, ‘the emperor, not wishing to recall the army
already dispatched to Italy because of the great expense to the imperial
fisc, did not wish to hear the supplications of the Pope. But Agapitus

39 Gorce, Les Voyages,l’hospitalit´ e,et le port des lettres dans le monde Chr´ etien des IVe et Ve si` ecles, 35–40.
40 Nicene to Arian: e.g. Theodosius II sends the Arian priest Bleda to Geiseric (Priscus, Fr., 31.1).
Arian to Nicene: Alaric I sends bishops from various Italian cities which he had captured to
Honorius (Zosimos v, 50.2); Theoderic I of Toulouse sends Orientius to Aetius (Vita Orientii,
3); Theoderic of Italy and Theodahad send popes John I and Agapitus to Constantinople (Liber
pont., 55, 59); possibly Hyd., c. 101 [92]: the Suevic king Hermeric sends Bishop Symphosius ad
comitatum. Jordanes, Get., 234: Sueves send locorum sacerdotes to the Goths of Toulouse; it is not
clear whether these are Arian or Nicene.
41
E.g. Procopius, Wars v, 4.9 (Justinian to Frankish kings); vii, 34.24 (Lombards to Justinian);
Gregory of Tours, Hist. ix, 16, 25: when the newly proselytised king of the Goths in Spain,
Reccared, approaches the Frankish kings Guntram and Childebert II for peace and a marriage
alliance in fide se... adserebat unum (Gothic Arianism had not precluded earlier Frankish–Gothic
marriage alliances).
Avitus of Vienne, Ep., 45 (MGH AA 6.2), encourages Clovis to use his legations to other
peoples as opportunities for proselytism.
42
Ennodius, Vita Epiphani, 136–77.
43
John I, sentby Theoderic (Marcellinus, Chron., s.a. 525; Anon. Val. pars post., 15.88–93; Liber
pont., 55); Agapitus, sent by Theodahad (Liber pont., 59; Liberatus of Carthage, Breviarium causae
Nestorianorum et Eutychianorum (PL 68), 21); the deacon Pelagius, a former papal apocrisiarius tothe
imperial court, sent by Totila (Procopius, Wars vii, 21.18–25). Cf. Leo I, attached to the embassy
of Valentinian III to Attila (Prosper, Chron., 1367).
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