CONSTANTINE IN ST. AMBROSE OF MILAN'S DE OBITU THEODOSII: RESHAPING AND REDEFINING THE EMPEROR'S ROLE IN THE AFTERMATH OF THE ARIAN CRISIS
Abstract
On Sunday, February 25th, 395, the ceremony that took place in one of Milan christian basilicae was not an usual one. Forty days after the death of Emperor Theodosius, the nobleman Aurelius Ambrosius, bishop of Mediolanum, accomplished the duty not only to celebrate the service, but also to praise the accession to Heaven happening to the dead Sovereign. By doing that, Ambrose played a role of the utmost importance for the self-understanding and the self-representing of the Imperial Court, carrying on a very difficult task. Despite the challenge, Ambrose did not only perform successfully the due (and expected) tribute to Theodosius, but was able to convert the traditional vision of the emperor – deeply marked by a centuries-long pagan imaginery – into a christian one, that in spite of the large number of non-christian people among his audience, nevertheless could be understandable to pagan ears, and in the same time proved evidently that even the most sacred rites of the Roman empire had to face the building of a Christian Weltanschauung. What happened in that occasion can be learned not only from the accounts of contemporary church historians (who are usually quite essential in their writings, whose value lies mostly in the information they give us about the presence of Theodosius’ relatives and close friends at the funeral rites), but also from the sermon preached by St. Ambrose during the service for the Emperor, whose text is enclosed in his works under the title De obitu Theodosii.
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