ARAM, 13-14 (2001-2002), 193-226H.I. MACADAM 193

STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: 'S SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL, CULTURAL CONTEXT*

In Memoriam: William A. Ward (1922-1996)

HENRY INNES MACADAM

ABSTRACT

Pierre Collinet's fundamentally important study, Histoire de l'École de Droit de Beyrouth (Paris, 1925), examined the evidence for the founding, development, influ- ence and demise of the famous law school at Beirut (which he dated to c. A.D. 200-551). He followed that five years later with a complementary volume, Biblio- graphie des Travaux de Droit Romaine (Paris, 1930). Those two books remain today the bedrock studies. Since then, more than a dozen articles, or chapters of books on Roman/, have been published which examine in some degree the role and function of Beirut's law school. New to this sur- vey is the argument that the Gospel of Mark originated in Beirut (see Appendix B), and a review of recent evidence for Beirut also being the provenance of Codex Bezae, both of which demonstrate the influence of that city's fundamental and pervasive Latinitas until at least the 5th century. The law school is best known to us from the Syriac translation of Zacharias of 's Life of Severus, Bishop of (c. 520) which casts a bright light on daily life in Byzantine Beirut while it details several unusual (and entertaining) epi- sodes in the career of one law school faculty member, Leontius of Beirut, and his influ- ence on both secular and religious life within the city and environs. Close analysis of that document (in the light of advances in Syriac study) plus the evidence of recently-published legal papyri and epigraphy (from Beirut and else- where), plus excavation reports (discussed in Appendix A), demonstrates the need to re-examine the foundation and institutions of Roman/Byzantine Beirut, some of its socio-religious aspects, and the history of its famous law school.

Since you affirm that you are devoting yourselves to liberalia studia, espe- cially with regard to the professio iuris, by residing in the civitas Berytorum of the province of Phoenice, we have decided that it is in the interest both of the public benefit and of your future advancement that each of you should not, up to your twenty- fifth year, be called away from your studies. Imperial Rescript, 4th century

* Thanks are due Cara MacAdam, who read an earlier version of this paper during the ARAM Twelfth International Conference, “Beirut: History and Archaeology” (American Uni- versity of Beirut, 13-16 April 1999). Linda Hall, St. Mary's College, Maryland (U.S.A.) and Bruce M. Metzger, Prof. Emeritus of New Testament, Princeton Theological Seminary, Princeton, NJ (U.S.A.), alerted me to useful references during the revision process, for which I owe them special gratitude. Any remaining errors are my responsibility. 194 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL

Education is the ancestral tradition of []; such studies have been granted her as the greatest boon. , 6th century

INTRODUCTION

Any investigation of the history of Beirut's Roman law school confronts the researcher with data requiring knowledge of military and legal terminology, social, and economic history, prosopography, epigraphy, numismatics, urban topography, archaeology and patristic studies. It also helps to appreciate the science of seismology. But one encounters these, and many others, in any attempt to outline the 700 year association of with the venerable Graeco- Phoenician city of Bei- rut, and the three and a half (or, as I will claim, four) century commitment by Rome to maintaining a law school in this important commercial city. Thus it's important to offer a caveat lector regarding the structure and content of this paper. Readers should know that much attention is given to Beirut's early associa- tion with Rome and Roman institutions. A “snapshot” of the Roman Near East is provided by the Expositio, a travel-guide of , allowing us to move backward and forward in time. Only after an account of Roman settlement in Beirut will the decision to found a school of law there make sense. For the earlier period of the law school's history, roughly from the second half of the second century to the end of the fourth century A.D., sources are meager and annoyingly vague. For the later period, the fifth and sixth centuries, sources are far more abundant. An early Byzantine biography of Severus, Bishop of Antioch (originally in Greek, now preserved in a Syriac translation) casts very bright light on daily life and presents some entertaining–on occasion astounding–episodes in the lives of faculty and students at the then-famous law school at the end of the fifth century. Finally, reports/records of the earthquake and tsunami that badly damaged Beirut and its hinterland in the summer of 551 give context to the demise of the law school. Beirut recovered from that natural disaster, and remained a part of the until the Arab Islamic conquest in the late 630s.

TRAVELS IN AN ANTIQUE LAND

In the mid-fourth century A.D. an anonymous Syrian (probably a Phoe- nician) translated from Greek into Latin two quaint and curious documents with the imaginative titles of A Description (Ekthésis) of the Happiness of H.I. MACADAM 195

Eden in Paradise and An Itinerary (Hodoiporía) from Eden of Paradise to (the Land of) the Romans. Both included accounts of legendary peoples on the fringes of the Roman world; both were attributed to an unnamed historian. To those rather fanciful accounts the translator added what we might call a Reader's condensed version of Prof. Tenney Frank's Economic Survey of . This consists of notes and observations on goods and prod- ucts, trade and commerce, of the provinces and cities within the Empire. Some of this material seems to be drawn from personal knowledge and some from secondary accounts. Only a small part of the original Greek Itinerary is extant.1 But what may be the full text of the Description, the Itinerary and the “Economic Survey” sur- vives today in a Latin document known as the Expositio Totius Mundi et Gentium (An Account of the Whole World and its Peoples).2 Much of what that contains is duplicated in a shorter Latin version conventionally known as the Descriptio. The French scholar René Mouterde referred to the Expositio as a Guide Bleu3 for the Roman traveler of the time. This is not a good analogy. There are features of the Expositio of interest to the armchair tourist or economic geogra- pher, and its author probably utilized maps available then, such as those cre- ated by Marinus of Tyre, Strabo, Ptolemy of , or the unknown car- tographer of the Peutinger Map.4 But the Expositio hardly serves as a “Byzantine Baedeker” for someone in need of useful travel tips. Despite its limitations it provides information other- wise unavailable. An example for the Roman Near East would be the follow- ing extract from Chapter XXIII: We then enter the country of Syria which is divided in thirds: (Syria) , (Syria) Palestine and (Syria) Coele. These contain a variety of cit- ies both notable and great. I may amuse my audience by mentioning some of these. Foremost is Antioch, a royal city and beautiful by any standard. In it

1 A. Klotz, “Hodoiporía apó Edem tou Paradeisou arkhi tôn Rhomaiôn,” RMP 65 (l9l0) 607- 616. 2 J. Rougé (ed.), Expositio Totius Mundi et Gentium (Sources Chrétiennes Vol. 124 [Paris, 1966]) is the best recent edition (Latin text with apparatus criticus, French translation, notes and commentary). Still useful but relatively obscure is an English translation (without a Latin text) by A.A. Vasiliev, “Expositio Totius Mundi,” Seminarium Kondakovianum 8 (1936) l-39. 3 Regards sur Beyrouth: Phénicienne, Hellénistique et Romaine (Beirut, Imprimerie Catholique, 1966) 36. This monograph is a reprint (with illustrations and an index) of Mouterde's article of the same title in MUSJ 40 (1964) 145-194. 4 On Marinus see now H.I. MacAdam, “Marinus of Tyre and Scientific Cartography: The Mediterranean, the Orient and Africa in Early Maps,” Graeco-Arabica 7/8 (2000) 254-261; on the others, see H.I. MacAdam, “Strabo, Pliny, Ptolemy and the Tabula Peutingeriana: Cultural Geography and Early Maps of Phoenicia” in Tomis Kapitan (ed) Archaeology, History and Cul- ture in Palestine and the Near East (Essays in Memory of Albert E. Glock) [American Schools of Oriental Research Books Vol. 3] (Atlanta, GA, Scholars Press, 1999) 267-299. 196 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL resides the Master of the World (dominus orbis terrarum). This is a city of splendor distinguished by its public buildings, and by a multitude of peoples from every corner of the earth. Antioch supplies the needs of all, and has all the best [of goods and services] in abundance.5

The sections in the Expositio (Chaps. XXIII-XXXIII) which describe Syria are more numerous and more comprehensive than for any other portion of the world. Moreover, Syria is utilized as a directional reference for other Eastern provinces such as Arabia (XXXVIII) and Egypt (XXXIV). Besides the capital Antioch-on-the-Orontes, nineteen Syrian cities are mentioned, a disproportion- ately large number, of which seven are Phoenician. Those geographical observations strongly suggest that the unknown author was himself a Syrian.6 The absence of specifically Christian notations coupled with frequent mention of pagan deities and shrines is also noteworthy. “Semitisms” in the Latin text argue strongly that the translator thought in a Semitic language even as he translated from Greek to Latin.7 The Expositio's effusive praise of Antioch has led some to suggest that the city was the author's “home town.” But in reality the only distinction in this description of the city is the reference to an imperial presence, i.e. the tempo- rary residence in Antioch of Constantius at the time of writing. One must search elsewhere in the Expositio to learn (e.g.) that Antioch possesses a circus (XXXII) or that it serves as a market for the great coastal ports of Laodiceia (XXVII) and Seleuceia (XXVIII). The city's prominence in the Expositio is more easily explained: between Constantinople and Alexandria only Antioch ranked as a “regional” capital. The descriptions of smaller provincial cities, such as those of Phoenicia (Punica in the text), are also less than comprehensive. Tyre, for instance, is said to be densely populated and devoted to business (XXIV). Tripolis and Byblos are likewise described as very industrious. and Sarepta equal Damascus in beauty (XXX), but the beauty of Damascus is nowhere de- scribed. Sarepta alone is noted as an exporter of dye (XXXI). Heliopolis, qualified by the phrase quae propinquat Libano monti, is fa- mous for its attractive women and its chorists. The former are “known throughout the [Mediterranean] world by the name of Libanitides.” They maintain a cult to Venus, who blesses them with extraordinary grace and beauty (XXX). The chorists are even more noteworthy “because the Muses of Lebanon inspire them with voices worthy of deities” (XXXII). Apart from the

5 That tripartite division of, and nomenclature for, Syria is anachronistic and reflects a situa- tion obtaining in the third century, after the provincial modifications of and before those of and later. But for private citizens who traveled from city to city the official name or precise borders of any province mattered little if at all. 6 Vasiliev, “Expositio” 31-33. 7 Rougé, Expositio 98-99. H.I. MACADAM 197 reference to the cult of Venus not a word is devoted to the stupendous temple- complex at Heliopolis. That is hardly what one would expect of a practical travel document. Byblos, Tyre and Beirut (we are told) export linen everywhere “and are dis- tinguished in the amount they produce” (XXXI). Tyre and Beirut, further- more, possess circuses and are famous for their mimes. But apart from these aspects of public entertainment there is something that sets Beirut completely apart and to which the author of the Expositio wishes to draw our attention: Berytus: an entirely charming city (civitas valde deliciosa); (one) that pos- sesses a school of law (auditoria legum = “recitation rooms for laws”) by which all Roman (is disseminated). From there come the law- yers (viri docti = “learned men“) who sit at the sides of governors throughout the world. They preserve through their knowledge the laws of the provinces, and it is through them that legal regulations (legum ordinationes) are trans- mitted to the empire (XXV).8

BEIRUT'S ROMAN IDENTITY

The Expositio's account is among the earliest bits of evidence we have of the preeminent place of Beirut among the three or four great centers of learn- ing in the late Empire. The Latin law school, what I might term the Roman University of Beirut by loose analogy with its modern counterpart, the Ameri- can University of Beirut, was the subject of much scholarly attention in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. Little archaeological work was possi- ble then.9 Paul Collinet's bibliography of French works alone, compiled 72 years ago, included l,324 entries.10 His own volume on that subject remains the definitive work.11 Herewith I offer a summary of the law school's history before docu- menting the career of one of its better-known teachers, Leontius, and the (mis)adventures of several of his students at the very end of the fifth century.

8 This is a particularly difficult passage because the text is uncertain. What I offer here is more of an interpretation. On the problems see Rougé, Expositio 244-245 and some alternative interpretations noted there. 9 Because of the massive rebuilding of downtown Beirut after the civil war (1975-1991), there has been an enormous amount of new archaeological work. For readers with a particular interest in that, I have grouped together in Appendix A the references to excavations which have some direct bearing on the subject of this essay. 10 P. Collinet, Bibliographie des Travaux de Droit Romaine en Langue Française (Paris, 1930). 11 Histoire de l'École de Droit de Beyrouth (Études Historiques sur le droit de Justinien Vol. 2 [Paris, 1925]). Collinet's research remained fundamental after WW II; see (e.g.) Leopold Wengert, Die Quellen des römischen Rechts (Vienna, 1953) esp. 619-632 for a full critique and new bibliography. Wengert largely substantiates what Collinet had to say on the subject. 198 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL

The circumstances and date of the law school's origins are uncertain and each demands some discussion.12 Collinet13 (followed by Mouterde14) sug- gested that Beirut became, by the late second century, the main repository of imperial rescripts concerning the eastern Empire. Local lawyers called upon to consult and then to elucidate such documenta- tion might have become, as Collinet surmised, the nucleus of the auditoria legum noted above. All that was needed to sanction a school of law was impe- rial interest. For Collinet that didn't occur until the reign of Septimius Severus, the “Libyan” emperor with cultural and familial ties to Syria and Phoenicia. Beirut's Roman character had been established in the early principate of when the Emperor, through his son-in-law (and heir apparent) Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, planted a military settlement there on the coast and extended its territorium to the inland cultic center at Heliopolis/ in the upper Biqa‘ Valley. Beirut received the official title Iulia Augusta Felix and included the cult-center of Heliopolis within its extensive territorium. Both settlements were located at the junction of major arteries of communication and trade. Bei- rut was a harbor-city on the coast road, and Heliopolis a major religious center on the parallel route that linked the northern Orontes River valley to the south- ern Jordan River valley. The soldiers settled in both places were seasoned vet- erans of the legions V Macedonica and VIII Gallica (Augusta).15 The traditional date for the foundation of Roman Beirut is 15/14 B.C. but recently a suggestion that Augustus or Agrippa refounded (or reinforced) an existing colony implanted just after the Battle of Actium (31 B.C.) has been resuscitated.16 The evidence for that is persuasive but not yet conclusive.

12 Nonnus, Dionysiaca Bks. 41-42 (5th cent.) gives the mythical account of the city's founda- tion and its association with the school. See below for a detailed account of that. 13 Histoire 20-22. 14 Regards sur Beyrouth 35. 15 For an excellent survey of the Roman settlements of Berytus and Heliopolis see Fergus Millar, “The Roman Coloniae of the Near East: a Study of Cultural Relations” in H. Solin & M. Kajava (eds), Roman Eastern Policy and Other Studies in Roman History (Helsinki, 1990) 7- 58, esp. 10-23. He accepts a date of 15 B.C. for the formal founding of the veteran colony there, a date supported by evidence from a Latin inscription (AE [1950] #233 of c. A.D. 85) apparently commemorating the centenary of that foundation: saeculo c(ondita) c(olonia)–see his discussion, ibid 15. See also the comments of Jean-Paul Rey-Coquais, “Villes Augustéenes d'Orient,” in Les Villes Augustéenes de Gaule (Autun, 1991) 141-150 at 149-150, reproducing a line from 's Digest (50.15.1.1): Berytensis colonia… Augusti beneficiis gratiosa (“the colonia of the Beirutians…grateful for the benefactions of Augustus”). 16 The traditional date is given by /Jerome (Chronica [ed. Fotheringham] p. 249) but see the proposal for a date prior to 27 B.C. in Meyer Reinhold, Marcus Agrippa: A Biography (New York, 1933 110-111, revived by L.J.F. Keppie, “Legions in the East from Augustus to Trajan” in D.L. Kennedy & P.W.M. Freeman (eds.) The Defense of the Roman and Byzantine East Vol. II (Oxford, 1986) 412. See also J.-M. Roddaz, Marcus Agrippa (Rome, 1984) 431-433 who accepts a settlement at Berytus “au moment de la démobilisation des armées triumvirales” (433). H.I. MACADAM 199

Strabo relates (Geog. 16.2.19) that Beirut “was destroyed by [the usurper king] Tryphon [142-139 B.C.] but now [i.e. at the time he wrote] the city has been restored by the Romans, (who) gave it [veterans of] two legions.” Surely Strabo's statement isn't meant to imply that Beirut (like Carthage from 146-46 B.C.) lay in ruins for a century before rebirth as a Roman colony. Since there is neither written nor archaeological evidence for the situation and status of the city between Tryphon and Augustus, we may surmise only that its physical location as well as its modest profile among the more distinguished Phoenician cities were important, even crucial, factors in its selection as a colonia. Nonnus of Panopolis (fifth century) preserves in his Dionysiaca (Bk. 41 passim) a colorful account of the law school's divine origins. The city and its namesake nymph, Beroë, are a grand prize in the epic confrontation between Poseidon and Dionysus. The city's association with the law school is evoked continually in phrases such as “handmaiden of the law” (41.10), “place of jus- tice” (41.145), and several allusions to Solon's Laws (41.165; 273;383). But the details of the law school's foundation are only revealed when divine Aphrodite reads from a tablet she holds “words of wisdom inscribed in many lines of Grecian verse:” When Augustus shall hold the scepter of the world, Ausonian Zeus will give to divine Rome the lordship, and to Beroë he will grant the reins of Law…until Berytus the nurse of quiet life does Justice on land and sea, fortifying the cities with the unshakable wall of Law, one city for all the cities of the world.17

The association of the law school with the reign of Augustus is surely anachronistic, i.e. the result of romantic conflation of the city's Augustan ori- gins and the later foundation of its legal institution. Whether the legend Nonnus relates in this section of the Dionysiaca was extant is his own day (470s? or even later), or whether he concocted it for the purpose it serves in his epic, is uncertain. The motive for the Augustan foundation isn't given but the obvious (and unpoetic) reason was Roman preoccupation with endemic incursions by the Ituraean , who still plagued the mountain regions of Phoenicia during the governorship of P. Sulpicius Quirinius in the first decade A.D. The exten- sive territory of Beirut/Heliopolis effectively provided a wedge between the

17 Dionysiaca 41.389-398 (Loeb translation). 200 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL northern and southern portions of what had been the Ituraean kingdom of the late Hellenistic period.18 It may have been two generations before mountain areas were secure and the inland roads safe for travel. Herod the Great, so Josephus tells us, saw fit to donate numerous civic amenities (exedra, porticos, temples and fora) for the embellishment of his pa- tron's colonia at Berytus and the promotion of his own ambitions. Beirut was the venue (suggested by Augustus) of the notorious trial in 7 B.C. of Herod's sons Alexander and Aristobulus. Both were condemned to death there and later executed for treason. The emperor's choice of Beirut for the legal proceedings foreshadowed the long and distinguished relationship between Berytus and the dynasty that Augustus allowed to govern most of the old Hasmonaean Kingdom. Judaea was gov- erned by imperial prefects from A.D. 6-41, each of whom may have passed through Beirut to and from the troubled province to the south. It is worth keeping that Beirut-Jerusalem contact in mind for the light it may shed on the development of earliest Christianity in Phoenicia (see below). Benefactions to Beirut continued in the very period when the nascent church was centered in Jerusalem. King Herod's grandson Agrippa I (A.D. 41-44) donated statues, sculptured works, an amphitheater, baths and a theater “which by its elegance and beauty surpassed all others.”19 A monumental Latin inscription on a lintel which once stood in the city's forum proclaims that still later in the first century Agrippa II and his wife Berenice rebuilt something “constructed earlier by their ancestor King Herod and ruined by [the passage of] time.”20 An aqueduct conveyed water from the nearby Magoras River [mod. Nahr Beirut] over three tiers of arches into Ro- man Berytus (see Appendix A for recent archeological work in the central area of Beirut). At some point a hippodrome was built, the outlines of which can still be seen in the street-patterns near the once-busy (and recently revived) downtown area of the modern city.21 Several generations of descendants from the initial military colonists meant that Berytus had become a source of citizen soldiers.

18 G.W. Bowersock, Augustus and the Greek World (Oxford, 1965) 71 and n. 2. On the campaign of Quirinius “against the Ituraeans of Mount Lebanon (in Libano monte), probably in A.D. 6, see ILS 2683. 19 On the Beirut trial: Josephus, Ant. 16.11.2; adornment of the city: Josephus, Wars l.21.11; Ant. 19.7.5; 20.9.4. Millar, “Roman Eastern Policy” 13 points out that the construction of an amphitheatre at Beirut is yet another indication of the city's “Roman-ness.” Within that amphi- theatre Agrippa I, according to Josephus [Ant. 19.7.5) held lavish games in which some 1,400 condemned prisoners fought as gladiators. That kind of spectacle is not normally associated with Hellenized cities within the Roman Near East. 20 AE (1928) 82; cf. R. Mouterde, “Monuments et Inscriptions de Syrie et du Liban: L'Emplacement du Forum de Béryte,” MUSJ 25 (1942/43) 17-40 at 31-32. 21 R. Mouterde & J. Lauffray, Beyrouth: Ville Romaine (Beirut, 1952) 11-12. On the maps given there, and modern plans of the city, see Appendix A to this article. H.I. MACADAM 201

At least one recruit from Beirut was present at the siege (A.D. 70-74) of Her- od's fabled fortress at Masada, the fall of which brought the protracted Jewish War to a conclusion.22 The epigraphy of Beirut and Heliopolis attests the civil development of the Colonia Iulia Felix, with the normal range of magistracies within the ordo Berytiorum. But what is often forgotten is that in addition to Beirut's indig- enous Phoenician culture, there was already by the Augustan era the imprint of the city's Hellenistic legacy – of which Fergus Millar is almost alone in re- minding us: Berytus was [never] a zone of purely Roman culture. Franz Cumont's de- scription of Berytus, Heliopolis and Ptolemais [Acco, along the coast of Pales- tine] as “Latin islands in the Semitic ocean”23 was indeed both overstated and misleading in a variety of different ways… There is no reason to suppose that the Greek-speaking population of Augustan Berytus was not incorporated in the colonia.24 The use of the Latin language for public notice isn't remarkable in any city or region deliberately colonized by Romans and given substantial numbers of veteran settlers. What is worthy of attention is how far Latin penetrated the territorium of Berytus, and how it predominated epigraphy until the fourth century. Benjamin Isaac has called attention to this: It is of more interest that inscriptions set up by private individuals tend to be in Latin as well. Again this is not surprising when these are serving sol- diers, or when serving soldiers are commemorated; it might well be evidence of the presence of an army unit in the town or in its vicinity. It is, however, clearly significant that Latin is used by civilians in the surrounding territory.25

Perhaps it's appropriate that from inland Heliopolis, which became a sepa- rate colonia/ordo with its own official urban identity under Septimius Severus, comes the Latin inscription attesting the last senatorial governor of any Near Eastern province. His name is L. Artorius Pius Maximus, and as legatus Augusti, vir clarissimus he honored the emperor Diocletian in the period 285-

22 B. Isaac, The Limits of Empire: The Roman Army in the East (2nd ed., Oxford, 1992) 446 refers to a pay record found at Masada mentioning the legionary C. Messius, C. filius) Fab(ia) Beru(tensis) with reference to H. Cotton & J. Geiger (eds), Masada II (1989) 37 # 722. For other recruits from Beirut, see Masada II, 50 and note 68. 23 Cambridge Ancient History XI (Cambridge, The University Press, 1936) 626. 24 Millar, “Roman Eastern Policy,” 17. 25 Limits of Empire 319. Fergus Millar, The Roman Near East: 31 B.C.-A.D. 337 (Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1993) 527-28 is careful to point out that Greek remained the liter- ary language of the Near East even in heavily Latinized cities such as Berytus. But he does find it “surprising that the major exponent of classical Roman jurisprudence should have been Domitius Ulpianus, who came from a known family of Greek-speaking ‘Oulpianoi' in the ancient Phoenician-Greek city of Tyre… long before his native city became a Roman colonia, probably in 198” (ibid, 528). 202 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL

297, before the new regime established a tetrarchical form of imperial govern- ment. After Artorius the governors of Syria Phoenicia (the provincial designa- tion since c. 200) are termed , and their status-designation changes to vir perfectissimus.26

BEIRUT AND EARLY CHRISTIANITY

There are not many references to Christianity in Beirut before the fourth century, but something should be said here because the city's Christian iden- tity is later just as important as its association with Phoenician, Greek and Ro- man culture. As we'll see, Gregory of Nazianzus was aware of a Christian community in Beirut during the years (c.250) when he and his brother Athe- nodorus studied law there. Gregory went on to become a student and friend of at Caesaraea further south.27 Yet there must have been a Christian community in Beirut before then. Bei- rut lay on the most direct route (by sea or by road) between Jerusalem and Antioch, and it therefore had close cultural contacts with Palestine via the Herodian dynasty, particularly with Herod the Great, his grandson Agrippa I and great-grandson Agrippa II. Although Beirut isn't mentioned in the NT, Sidon/Tyre are on several occa- sions, most notably in the Gospel of Mark (7:24-30). Phoenicia was one of several regions evangelized by Jerusalem Christians after the execution of Stephen (Acts 11:9) and the dispersal of the “Hellenists,” the Greek-speaking Jews whose theology ran afoul of the Temple authorities. That had occurred in the mid-30s A.D., and the missionary work shortly thereafter. We know that Paul put in at Tyre on his final trip to Jerusalem c. AD 57/58; he and his traveling companions “looked up disciples there and stayed for seven days” (Acts 21:3-4). Two years later, when Paul was being transported to Rome to stand trial before Nero, his ship put in at Sidon and the centurion in charge “allowed [Paul] to visit some friends and be cared for by them” (Acts 27:3). It would be odd if Beirut and Phoenicia's northern coastal cities (Byblos, Tripoli, Arados) were not also home to small Christian communities before the First Jewish War of 66-70, a watershed event in the development of apostolic Christianity. In fact, Beirut was the third major stop on the triumphal tour of Titus in the immediate aftermath of that war. Vespasian's victorious son

26 Jean-Paul Rey-Coquais, “Syrie romaine, de Pompée à Dioclétien", JRS 68 (1978) 44-73 at p. 67 (=IGLS VI # 2721). Rey-Coquais' register of governors has only recently been superseded (for the period 27 B.C.-A.D. 211) by Edward Dabrowa, The Governors of Roman Syria from Augustus to Septimius Severus (Bonn, R. Habelt, 1998), a reference I owe to Linda Hall. For the governors of Syria (including Phoenicia) for late antiquity see PLRE. 27 Philip Hitti, Lebanon in History2 (London & N.Y., MacMillan, 1962) 228-230. H.I. MACADAM 203 stopped there after celebrations in Caesaraea Philippi/Banias and then at Caesaraea Maritima on the Palestinian seacoast: Titus [celebrated his brother's (Domitian's) birthday in Caesaraea and] next went on to Beirut, a Roman colonia in Phoenicia. Here he made a longer stay, celebrating his father's birthday [17 November] with a still more lavish display [than for Domitian], both in the magnificence of the shows, and in the originality of the other costly entertainments. Vast numbers of prisoners per- ished in the same way [gladiatorial games; public executions] as before [i.e.in the two Caesaraeas] (BJ 7.3.1).

The focus of that event in Beirut, the strong tradition of Christian communi- ties in Sidon and Tyre prior to that, and the specific references to Jesus' own journeys into “the territoria of Tyre and Sidon” (Mark 3:8 and parallels) indi- cate that all the coastal cities of Phoenicia had been evangelized by the time of the First Jewish War. Except for Sidon, whose Jewish community Josephus (BJ 17-19) says es- caped any retaliation, Tyre in particular, and presumably the other major Phoenician cities (including Beirut) saw specific persecutions of Jews (we must include the Jewish-Christians within those cities) at the outbreak of the Jewish War in 66. Given the already strong Latin tradition in Beirut, three centuries of Hellenization under the Ptolemies and Seleucids, a Jewish community of per- haps great antiquity, and the city's close proximity to the location of Jesus' birth, ministry and death, I would suggest that this city, and not Rome (the tra- ditional view) is a prime candidate to be the provenance of the Gospel of Mark. Though it isn't possible to argue that in detail here, I will outline (see Appendix B) what I plan to discuss in a subsequent publication.28

THE ORIGINS OF THE LAW SCHOOL

Beirut was granted Italicum, but both the date and substance of that honor are uncertain. There is reason to think that these “Italian rights” were bestowed on Beirut no later than the first or second quarter of the second cen- tury.29 The vexed question of what benefits actually accrued to cities with ius Italicum30 need not detain us. But it is worth considering that the modification of Beirut's civic status may have been coeval with the establishment of the law school and that (contra

28 On Paul in Tyre see my “‘The True and Lively Word': The Acts of the Apostles at the end of the Twentieth Century,” Theological Review 21 (2000) 170-216 at 190-92. 29 The first mention of Beirut possessing is the Digest (50.l5.7) compiled under Justinian. The reference there is attributed to the great jurist whose date is fixed no more precisely than the second century. 30 A.N. Sherwin-White, The Roman Citizenship2 (Oxford, 1973) 316-322. 204 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL

Collinet and others) we may look to the early second century for both. If so we might credit these events to the reign of Trajan (98-117) or (117-135). Trajan has little direct association with Phoenicia. His father was governor of Syria in the 70s, and the emperor himself may have consulted the oracle at Baalbek prior to his Parthian campaign in 114/115. But we know from the Byzantine lexicon called the Suda (s.v. “Paulus of Tyre”) that Tyre received from Hadrian the status of metropolis, an important civic distinction and rec- ognition of its cultural association with Rome's ancient enemy in the western Mediterranean, Carthage. The Hadrianic forestry inscriptions are yet another manifestation of imperial interest in Phoenicia, and that is probably true also of a Latin inscription of Hadrianic date which appears to record improvements to the harbor at Byblos.31 It is not at all improbable that the bestowal of ius Italicum on Beirut and the formal establishment of a law school there were also benefactions of an Emperor famous for his generosity to eastern cities. There is some indirect evidence as well for a Hadrianic founding of the law school. That is, in part, Hadrian's own interest in improving Roman jurispru- dence, attested in an obscure passage of Gaius' Institutiones (1.7); Hadrian's own rescriptio regarding juristic (official opinions) is known.32 An additional factor, less certain than the foregoing, is that Gaius completed a commentary on a Roman law (Senatus Consultum Orfitianum) while resident in Berytus.33 But the majority opinion still prefers a date in the reign of Septimius Severus (193-211). Certainly the strong Libo-Phoenician and Syro-Phoenician element in the Severan family must be a consideration. Severus granted ius Italicum and colonial rights to Tyre for its support in his struggle against Niger. Once again that city's imperial honor is augmented by its cultural ties to Lepcis Magna and Sabratha in Severus' native province of Libya. According to Ulpian (Digest 50.l5.l), who was a native of Tyre, Heliopolis was declared a respublica iuris Italici under Severus, and only then began to coin–clear enough proof that it was regarded as separated from Beirut. Several prominent jurists, and Ulpian among them, were highly favored by Severus.

31 CIL 3.6696. That is now republished in my “Philo of Byblos and the Phoenician History: Ethnicity and Culture in Hadrianic Lebanon” in N.J. Higham (ed), Archaeology of the : A Tribute to the Life and Work of Prof. Barri Jones (Oxford, Archaeopress [BAR Inter. Series # 940], 2001) 189-204 at 197-98. 32 W.M. Gordon & O.F. Robinson (eds. & trans.), The Institutes of Gaius (London, Duck- worth, 1988) 23. On this point see A. Torrent, “La ordinatio edicti en la politica juridica de Adriano,” Annuario de Historia del Derecho Español 53 (1983) 17-44. 33 A.M. Honoré, Gaius (Oxford, The Clarendon Press, 1962) 126; “It is impossible to show a direct connexion between Gaius and the , but if a tradition connected him with it, this would partly account for Justinian's use [of the expression] Gaius noster: [i.e.] the founder of our most famous law school” (ibid). H.I. MACADAM 205

Perhaps the most specific connections between Beirut and the Severan dy- nasty are the three Latin inscriptions so far discovered and published which honor not Septimius Severus, but his wife Iulia Domna. Through her birth at, and connections to a priestly family of, Edessa () she may well have con- sidered herself, and received the recognition as, a Phoenician and not just a “Syrian.”34 The first indisputable evidence of the school's existence is from St. Gregory “The Wonder-Worker,” in a on Origen (A.D. 239) in which (Chap. V) he refers to Beirut as a “most Roman city, a place of instruction in the law.”35 Gregory himself intended to study there, but his friendship with Origen drew him away to the Church instead. By the end of the fourth century, a gen- eration or more after the Expositio, the celebrated rhetor of Antioch mentioned in several letters “lovely Beirut, the mother of laws,” but observed that Latin, rather than Greek, was the language of instruction.36 That notion of Latinitas in Berytus as late as the life of Libanius (314-393) is important, not only for defining the curriculum at the School of Law, but for the larger cultural identity of the city and its closest hinterland:37 So important and busy an institution as the law school and the legal ar- chives will have generated its own Latin culture. Native Latin speakers will have been attracted Eastward–language teachers and scribes and lawyers. That Westerners went to teach Latin at Constantinople is evidence for this. Certainly there will have been a demand for many scribes [proficient in Latin], experts in the conservation and copying of all kinds of legal texts. They will have maintained a living Latin tradition within this Greek world.38

BEIRUT AND BYZANTINE CHRISTIANITY

An adjunct to that civil aspect is the religious expression in Berytus throughout those same centuries of intense Latin/Roman identity. Beirut was

34 Kevin E.T. Butcher, “A New Dedication to from Berytus,” BAAL 1 (1996) 212-214 with reference to the earlier two inscriptions honoring her. See Linda Jones Hall, “Latinitas in the Late Antique Greek East: Cultural Assimilation and Ethnic Distinctions" in S. Byrne and E. Cueva (eds), Veritas Amicitiaeque Causa: Essays in Honor of Anna Lydia Motto and John R. Clark (Chicago, Bolchazy-Carducci, 1999) 85-111 at 88-89 for a brief discussion of the significance of this epigraphy and the Severan promotion of Phoenician identity. 35 , Panegyricus in Originem (PG X 1065-66 = A. Roberts & J. Do- naldson (eds.), The Ante-Nicene Christian Library Vol. 20 (1871) pp. 47-52. Cf. Collinet, His- toire 18; 26-27. 36 Collinet, Histoire 35-39. 37 Hall, “Latinitas," 89-93. See also Hall's contribution to this same volume of ARAM, i.e. “Classical Beirut Through the Texts: From Colonia to Civitas." 38 David C. Parker, Codex Bezae: An Early Christian Manuscript and its Text (Cambridge, The University Press, 1992) 272. I wish to thank Bruce M. Metzger for bringing this important study to my attention. 206 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL exceptional among the many early Christian communities developing in the eastern Mediterranean precisely because of its intense Latinitas. Those com- munities were extensively Hellenized, and the Christians resident within them naturally utilized the Greek New Testament for liturgical and other pur- poses. It would seem that if Christianity were to make headway in Beirut, it would have to find a Latin voice as early as possible, just as it was finding an Ara- maic (Syriac) voice in the non-Hellenized, indigenous towns and villages of the interior regions of the Near East. There may now be some evidence for early Latin Christianity in Beirut thanks to a recent study by David C. Parker of the late 4th or early 5th century bilingual document known as Codex Bezae.39 Parker has argued that At a point early in the third century the Roman law school at Berytus was burgeoning: more Latin speakers were arriving in the city, and beginning to establish their own society. Many of these knew little or no Greek, and the need for Latin [NT] scriptures became pressing. Up to this point we have no clear location for [other] Greek and Latin texts [of the NT]. It may be, and this is the simplest possibility, that the independent Latin versions were the earliest stage of the non-Greek [NT] in Berytus, and that they were [trans- lated] from the Greek [NT] texts already in use there.40

That Latin translation (first of the Gospels, later of Acts and other NT books) might be designated Phase I of the scenario sketched by Parker. Phase II of his (admittedly hypothetical) reconstruction is the production of a bi-lin- gual Gospel in parallel columns on the same codex page, perhaps later in that same third century. Phase III was a codex with the Greek text on the left, and the Latin on the right, first completed c. 400. The prime example of the last stage is Cambridge University's Codex Bezae, which Parker believes served as a church lectionary which could be read in “official” Greek as well as in Latin, the latter the mother tongue of one of several Christian communities in early Byzantine Beirut.41 There were num- bers of earlier Latin translations of some parts of the NT, mainly from western Mediterranean Christian communities (North Africa certainly, Rome and else- where in Europe less so), but nothing bilingual or inclusive that antedates Codex Bezae.42

39 Parker, Codex Bezae Chapter 16: “The History of a Text” (pp. 279-286). 40 Parker, Codex Bezae 280; see also his comment on p. 28: “The Latin column of Codex Bezae… is written in a form of half-uncial developed in the East, used most frequently in the production of legal texts, and possibly associated with Berytus” and pp. 268-78 for his back- ground sketch of the law school(s) in Beirut. 41 Parker, Codex Bezae 281. 42 For a good summary of how the Latin (Vulgate) Bible, both OT and NT, evolved see NJBC (1990) 68: 141-147. H.I. MACADAM 207

Regardless of when or how the Latin bible came to Beirut, dominance of Latin at the law school as well as in the cultural life of the city – in particular the Church – was on the wane by the late fifth century. Without doubt the Ostrogothic invasions of Italy at that time had something to do with it. Though we don't as yet understand why, there is now evidence for another change that occurred c.375-525 in the development of books, and one in which the Roman law school in Beirut probably played a large part.

CODICES AND LEGAL STUDIES

That innovation is the “new-style” codex used for literary and legal textual study and exposition. These are large-format codices in which the text is cop- ied out in the center of the page, intentionally leaving wide margins on either side for commentary or glosses. Several partial examples come from Egypt, most dating between the late fourth to the early sixth centuries. Examples of these “new-format codices” have been set out recently in a study of scholia, and the author has observed that the proportion of legal pa- pyri is noticeably higher than literary papyri.43 Since Egypt was never a great center of Roman law (though a school of law did function at Alexandria44), most if not all the documents so far discovered must have come from another city in which existed a legal center. Beirut would be the natural choice. It's also possible that the Latin fragments of scripture on papyrus also originated in Beirut, but that is much more speculative. Beirut was only one of three cities which eventually received a formal char- ter for its informal auditoria legum.45 This was a privilegium studii, authoriz- ing a faculty and a curriculum, granted by imperial favor. At the same time Beirut received, at the expense of Tyre, the status of metropolis of Phoenicia. The terms of the priviligia and the exact date (A.D. 425) for the other two “State Schools” established – at Rome and at Constantinople – are known. Collinet has argued persuasively for a date c. 438-450 for the granting of this priviligium to Beirut.46

43 Kathleen McNamee, “Another Chapter in the History of Scholia,” Classical Quarterly 48 (1998) 269-288. I wish to thank Linda Hall for bringing this article to my attention. 44 “Tribonium, speaking obviously from knowledge, relates that at Alexandria, Caesaraea (Palestine) and elsewhere were to be found ignorant teachers of false doctrine […homines devagare doctrinam discipulis adulterinam tradere]… Justinian [in 533] forbade the teaching of law outside the three imperial universities of Rome, Berytus and Constantinople.” Fritz Schulz, The History of Roman Legal Science (Oxford, The Clarendon Press, 1946) 273. 45 Millar, Roman Near East 280 takes a minimalist view of what legal instruction at Beirut actually entailed: “We know nothing of the formal structure of teaching there, and are hardly entitled to speak of a ‘law school.' Rather it was the wider, ‘Roman' cultural setting and the pos- sibility of finding instruction in Roman law in different ‘schools' (auditoria) which attracted [students].” Whence comes that view is difficult to ascertain, since Millar has nothing else to say about the study of law in Beirut. I understand auditoria to mean lecture halls within an institu- tional setting, not schools. 46 Histoire 45-46; 176-83. 208 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL

Traditionally the school (or schools) of law has been localized in buildings directly adjoining the cathedral constructed under Eustathius, bishop of Beirut, before 449, on the site of an earlier church destroyed during the reign of Julian the Apostate.47 Collinet has pointed out several parallels from the Roman and Islamic periods for the symbiosis of religion and education in adjacent build- ings.48 Unfortunately the precise location of that cathedral has never been estab- lished archaeologically, though speculation continues to center on the area be- tween the site of the Maronite and Greek Orthodox cathedrals of St. George. They once stood in the area of Beirut known to be the commercial center of the Byzantine city, within a short distance of the harbor (see Appendix A for recent reports of archaeological work in that area). From the fifth century on the course of instruction and the names of many faculty and students are known. Greek began to replace Latin as the language of instruction in the later fifth century (mentioned above), a development which Libanius would have liked. There are several reasons for that, which we can review here briefly. One is the declining importance of the western, predominantly Latin, por- tion of the Roman Empire, certainly from the time of Constantine the Great, and later in the same century (395) precipitated by Theodosius' formal divi- sion of eastern and western portions of the empire between his two sons: Attendant upon this division, and probably related to it, Greek replaced Latin at some time in the late fourth or early fifth century as the language of instruction in Eastern law schools… The second innovation in fifth-century le- gal education in the East arose from the first, and was pedagogical in nature. Instructional methods changed in order to accommodate ever-increasing num- bers of Latinless students of Roman law.49 Grammar, rhetoric and to a lesser extent philosophy were required of all entering students as prerequisites to the study of law. Latinless students would begin studies by consulting an index, i.e. a translation into Greek of the legal text at hand. These indices became a permanent fixture of the curriculum and served a secondary purpose making more accessible the realm of sometimes arcane documents. The age of students is uncertain but the exact duration of their studies is not. Collinet estimated between ages 20 and 30 for the former, with some enter- ing the school after a period of employment. A five-year program of study (quinquennium) from matriculation to graduation was standard.50 Although

47 Collinet, Histoire 62-63. See also PLRE II 672 s.v. “Leontius (20).” 48 Histoire 73-75. 49 McNamee, “Scholia,” 272-273. 50 Histoire, p. 112. Apringius of Constantinople in 364 took time off from his duties as advocatus to enroll in the school. This must have been unusual (ibid. p. 86). H.I. MACADAM 209

Greek was the language of instruction, students were expected to be proficient in Latin. It is known that each student had a basic library of six books, presum- ably excerpts from legal documents, totalling 60,000 lines of text. These may have been arranged in parallel columns of Latin and a corresponding Greek translation: Bilingual commentaries… seem a natural development in the context of le- gal education in the East in late antiquity. A change so radical as a change in the language of instruction from Latin to Greek–whether it came by decree or by default–would have required the production of a new battery of teaching materials by which teachers could help students find their way from the Latin text of Roman law to the Greek of oral instruction.51

FACULTY AND STUDENTS

For both students and faculty we are less informed about the early period (third-fourth century) than about the later period (fifth-sixth century). Various claims have been made that legal luminaries such as Gaius, Ulpian and Papinian were on the faculty during the third century. Certainty begins only with the mid-fourth century, about the time that the Latin version of the Expositio was produced. What is probably a commemorative inscription or even the epitaph (in Greek) of a fifth century teacher, Patricius, was discovered in Beirut at the be- ginning of the 20th century.52 Presumably this is the Patricius well-attested in the legal literature of the sixth century.53 The students came from a diversity of places throughout the Empire, pre- dominantly from the eastern provinces if we include Anatolia and Egypt. They came from as far west as Rome, Illyricum and Euboea, and as far east as Ar- menia. We know of some from contemporary or later literary sources and of others from random discoveries, either papyrological (exclusively from Egypt) or epigraphic.54 Students ranged in wealth and social status from the sons of a senatorial family in Constantinople to sons of working-class families in several prov-

51 McNamee, “Scholia,” 275. McNamee has reproduced a portion of the text of the pre- Justinian commentary on Ulpian referred to as the Scholia Sinaitica because of its provenance (Ad Ulpiani Libros ad Sabinum). It was lost once again not long after its rediscovery; her com- mentary on this (ibid 274-275) is instructive. 52 Collinet, Histoire 135-138. This was originally published by Louis Jalabert, “Inscriptions grecques et latines de la Syrie,” MUSJ l (1906) 170-171 # 36. See also Mouterde & Lauffray, Regards sur Beyrouth l4 and note #l. 53 PLRE II 839 s.v. “Patricius (10).” 54 The latter, a metrical verse inscription (inadvertently called a “papyrus verse epitaph” in Hall, “Latinitas,” 90) was originally published by Frank J. Gilliam, “A Student at Berytus in an Inscription from Pamphylia,” ZPE 13 (1974) 147-150 (= SEG 26 #1456). 210 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL inces. Linda Hall quotes a revealing passage from Libanius' Oratio (62.21) whereby the orator “affirms that the law schools were open to young men from poorer backgrounds:” But indeed, on the one hand, formerly one could see the youths from the workshops [artisans] who are concerned about a barely sufficient livelihood, going to Phoenicia to study the laws. On the other hand, those young men of the wealthy houses who have distinguished lineage, property, and fathers who have carried out their curial duties, remained in our studies.55

We know most about the extra-curricular life of several students (and one of their eminent professors of law) from a remarkable early sixth century biogra- phy called the Life of Severus. The author was Zacharias56 from Maiuma, the port of Gaza in Palestine. His “Life”is a pious tribute to his friend and fellow- student, “the holy saint” Severus from Sozopolis (in Pisidia).57 Although a work of hagiography from an age of such devotional literature, it is nonethe- less regarded as a useful historical document. Zacharias' biography of Severus was originally written in Greek, long lost but surviving (apparently in its entirety apart from several lacunae) in a Syriac translation. Scholars of the late 19th century, and early 20th century, exhibited great interest in this unusual document, which has been largely ignored since then. The Syriac text of some fifty printed pages has been twice edited58 and translated (to my knowledge) four times: once into Latin (selected passages only), twice into French (full text), and once into English (a partial translation only).59 The French translation by M.-A. Kugener (Vie de Sévère) remains the standard, and it is to that version (as “Vie”) that all references below are made. Kugener's translation is based on his own edition of the text (see note 58 above) and appears printed, in half-pages, with the Syriac above and French

55 Hall, “Latinitas,” 92. The passage quoted is her translation. 56 PLRE II 1194-95 s.v. “Zacharias 4;” cf. ODCC2 s.v. “Zacharias Scholasticus.” Doubts as to whether Zacharias Rhetor, Zacharias Scholasticus, and Zacharias of Maiuma were one and the same person were dispelled by E. Honigmann, Patristic Studies (Rome, 1953) 194-204, esp. 199 ff. 57 Collinet, Histoire 102-106; ODCC2 s.v. “Severus.” There is no entry for this Severus in PLRE II. 58 The German edition: M. Spanuth, Zacharias Rhetor: Das Leben des Severus von Antio- chien in syrischer Uebersetzung (Göttingen, 1893); the French edition: M.-A. Kugener in PO II (1907) 5-115. 59 Spanuth's Syriac text was first translated by M. Nau in ROC 4 (1899) 343-353; 544-571 and ROC 5 (1900) 74-98. A partial English translation: Robin A. Darling Young, “Zacharias: The Life of Severus,” in Vincent L. Wimbush (ed.), Ascetic Behavior in Greco-Roman Antiquity (Minneapolis, MN, Fortress Press, 1990) 312-328. Young is circumspect in referring to her pres- entation as a partial translation. There is no critical apparatus, and she makes it appear (through transliterations) as if the original version were Greek rather than Syriac. H.I. MACADAM 211 below.60 Kugener also edited and translated another Syriac Life of Severus which has no information regarding the years of Severus' residence in Bei- rut.61 The prologue to the Life of Severus mentions that the friendship between Zacharias and Severus was formed during their preparatory years in Alexan- dria (Vie 7). There, under the tutelage of the well-known Sopater, they studied grammar and rhetoric, comparing and contrasting the works of Libanius, Basil and Gregory among others (Vie 12-13). Severus preceded Zacharias to Beirut by a year, entering the law school in the fall of 486 or 487. We shall return to the two of them, but here it will be profitable to pause momentarily and review the career of one of their profes- sors of law.62

LEONTIUS THE MAGISTER

The leading lecturer of the time was Leontius, a native of Beirut. Leontius was the son of Eudoxius, a well-known jurist, and the father of Anatolius, who would later be appointed commissioner of Justinian's Digest. Leontius' legal expertise later earned him praise as vir legum peritissimus, “a man exception- ally skilled at law.” Collinet unhesitatingly identified Leontius the professor of law with the ho- monymous (and contemporary) Praetorian Prefect of the East who served un- der Anastasius.63 The editors of the Prosopography of the Later Roman Em- pire unhesitatingly ascribed separate entries to each.64 The issue is clouded by

60 Collinet (Histoire p. 46 and notes 2 & 3) provides a useful summary of research at the turn of the century. Other works attributed to Zacharias the Rhetor (=Zacharias Scholasticus) have been rendered into English (F.J. Hamilton & W.W. Brooks, The Syriac Chronicle known as that of Zachariah of [London, 1899] and into German (K. Ahrens & G. Krüger, Die sogenannte Kirchengeschichte des Zacharias Rhetor [Leipzig, 1899]). These should not be con- sulted without reference to the learned review article of M.-A. Kugener, “La Compilation Historique de Pseudo-Zacharie le Rhéteur,” ROC 5 (1900) 201-l4; 461-80. 61 PO II (1907) 205-264. For the life of Severus–with special emphasis on his theological writings–see R.C. Chestnut, Three Monophysite Christologies: , Philoxenus of Mabbug, and Jacob of Sarug (Oxford, The University Press, 1976); and Iain Torrance, Christology after Chalcedon: Severus of Antioch and Sergius the Monophysite (Norwich, U.K., Canterbury Press, 1988). 62 For useful background on the dynamics of pagan-Christian relations in late antiquity in Beirut, see Frank R. Trombley, Hellenic Religion and Christianization c. 370-529, 2 vols. (Leiden, E.J. Brill, 1993), Vol. II Chapter V (pp. 1-51) – esp. “The Philoponoi in Berytus and the Eradication of Magic,” 29-45. Trombley provides an additional sidelight on Severus as a student in Beirut and his conversion after visiting the shrine of St. Leontius in Tripoli (Phoenicia)–see pp. 49-51 and the bibliography therein. 63 Collinet, Histoire 149-152. 64 s.v. “Leontius (23),” 672-673. There is no reason to posit a familial relationship between this person and the [Flavius? Domitius?] Leontius, Praetorian Prefect in the preceding century (on the latter see especially Hall, “Latinitas,” 94-95, reproducing the epigraphic evidence, and 212 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL textual interpretation regarding the name of Leontius' father, but it would seem that Collinet is correct. Surely then, as now, a well-known teacher attracted students as much as the institution with which that teacher was associated. So it may have been with Leontius and what were to be, in the 490s, two of his most famous students: Zacharias and Severus, the former of whom immortalized Leontius in the bio- graphical sketch of the latter. Zacharias notes that upon his arrival in Beirut he found himself exempt from most of the traditional derision meted out to “freshmen” (Vie 47). This was undoubtedly due in part to his friendship with Severus, by then a student in his second year and already familiar with the academic and cultural atmos- phere of the city. Zacharias spent his first few evenings taking in the sites of early Byzantine Beirut, much of which had been built or rebuilt in the aftermath of a severe earthquake in the mid-fourth century (A.D. 349). The port area near which the school was located was a natural attraction; there among the taverns and brothels Zacharias, disapprovingly, found the future Patriarch of Antioch bus- ily pursuing extra-curricular activities. Severus was apparently given to enjoyment of the worldly pleasures which his younger “freshman” friend Zacharias considered to be quite un-Christian. Distractions for a devoted pagan such as Severus were many: betting on the “Blues” or the “Greens” in the hippodrome was simply one of the most popu- lar. There were also shows at the theaters, expensive spectacles at the amphi- theater, and the company of the belles de nuit for which the city has always been famous. With such diversions at hand the rigors of the law school must have seemed less onerous. Severus was quick to demonstrate to the reproving Zacharias that he was no monk (Vie 51-52). The law school was “in session” five and a half-days a week, Monday morning through Saturday noon. First year students were called dupondii– which is best translated as “novices” or “neophytes.” Collinet notes that raw recruits (tirones) in the Roman military were also referred to as dupondii.65 The survival of the term in this context must harken back to the early days of the veteran settlement in Beirut when a dupondius was still the standard rate of military pay. There is some evidence that Beirut's “civilian dupondii” un- derwent a form a “hazing” or “ragging” that entering students at some Anglo- American institutions still endure. Initial studies were focused on the Institutes of Gaius. Second year students devoted much time to Ulpian's Libri ad Edictum and consequently were nick- also Timothy D. Barnes, Ammianus Marcellinus and the Representation of Historical Reality [Ithaca & London, Cornell University Press, 1998] 61; 113-14). Barnes suspects that Domitius Leontius was the father of the Leontius who later became praefectus urbi (at Antioch). 65 Histoire 225 note #5. H.I. MACADAM 213 named edictales. Third year students were dubbed Papinianistae for their ef- forts toward interpreting Papinian's Responsa. The fourth year was given over to the study of another Responsa, that from the pen of the jurist Paul. The sobriquet students earned for that was lytai. The exact meaning of the Greek term has occasioned some debate, but it would appear to be the equiva- lent of Latin solutores, i.e. “resolvers” (of legal cases). Those students who survived the first four years, and opted for a supplementary fifth, were known as prolytai (praesolutores). The exact course of study is uncertain, but it seems probable that it focused on imperial constitutions.66 The duration and intensity of study demonstrates that lawyers had to rely on more than just savoir faire and a glib tongue to enter the profession. Indeed, after the year 460 it became illegal to practice law without passing a “bar exam” (Cod. Just. 2.7.11). The early reign of Justinian saw major curriculum changes in the law school(s). On l January 534 a revised course of study was implemented. The first year reading was augmented to include books l-4 (the Prôta) of the Di- gest. The humble dupondii were now entitled to be called Iustiniani novi. Selections from the Digest were also required reading for years two through four, though the students' nicknames remained the same. The fifth year read- ing for prolytai was the Code. A five year training period wasn't the only tem- poral restriction. “In Beirut, the limit [of study] for law students, from Diocletian's time to Justinian's, was [age] twenty-five.”67 The law students' academic days were divided between private study and “classroom” discussions. Mornings were devoted to individual reading and preparations. Classes were held in the afternoons within the skôlê or courtroom on the school grounds. Recent archaeological excavations within the ancient city-center have not pinpointed the remains of any buildings that can be identi- fied with the law school itself (see Appendix A). The method of instruction was traditional: the reading and exegesis of passages or words which were deemed essential to a full understanding of a particular law text. It was the duty of teachers such as Leontius to select the text, lead the discussion and, wherever relevant, to introduce the opinion of other eminent jurists whose works were by then considered to be “clas- sics.”68

66 Ibid. pp. 219-240. There is a concise summary of this in M.L. Clarke, Higher Education in the Ancient World (London, 1971) 116-117. It would seem that a sixth year of studies, devoted to Justinian's Novellae, may have been instituted at Constantinople, c.555. The Novellae were amendments and additions (in Greek) to the Digest, Codex and Institutes. 67 Henri-Irénée Marrou, A History of Education in Antiquity (New York, Sheed & Ward, 1956) 302 with reference to Cod. Iust. X.50.1. 68 Marrou, Education in Antiquity 240-242. For the history of legal studies from the fifth cen- tury on see (e.g.) H.J. Scheltema, “Byzantine Law” in the Cambridge Medieval History Vol. 4.2 (Cambridge, The University Press, 1967) 55-77, esp. 55-59 for Beirut. 214 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL

STUDIA ET CIRCENSES

But law did not exercise a complete monopoly on the students' waking hours. By the late fifth century (the time of Leontius) the curriculum had been broadened to include philosophy and belles lettres. Yet for those who wanted intellectual activity that was non-academic, or simple diversion, the student societies were the answer. There must have been as many as there were groups of students who shared a common interest. Zacharias himself takes credit for the founding of one such societas studiorum, devoted to Christian prayer and thought. Within just that one “club” could be found a diversity of “nationalities”: fellow members came from Samosata in Commagene, Edessa in Osroene, Patara in , Alexan- dria in Egypt. Some of them became in time members of a select group of lay persons who earned distinction within the Church as philoponoi.69 Adherents of the philoponoi like Zachariah sought to keep themselves free of taint from the prevailing modes of their peers, but also to lure mediocre catechumens and even some Hellenes into the churches. They effected many conversions among [Beirut] law students by purely intellectual methods. Infor- mal association, using the methods of the philoponoi, gave institutional struc- ture to these activities.70

The personal names known to us (e.g. Anastasius, Philip, Anatolius, Zenodorus, Stephen) are consistently Graeco-Roman, making it impossible to gauge the ethnic background with any accuracy. The cement which held to- gether this “holy” society was the piety of its individual members, who met to pray “each evening in the church of the Resurrection” (Vie 55). The standard was set by its elected president, Evagrius, who fasted regu- larly, remained celibate and bathed once annually, on the evening of Holy Sat- urday. Not surprisingly Severus at first shunned the collective company of such ascetics but later, to the delight of Zacharias, became attracted enough to foreswear the eating of meat (Vie 56-57). For the bon vivant other societies offered activities of a less discreet nature. Such was the infamous “Magical Society,” a club whose membership in- cluded an Illyrian, an Egyptian, an Asian (i.e. from Asia Minor) and an Arme- nian from Heliopolis. Though Heliopolis might refer to the temple-city in

69 Philoponos may mean “laborious,” “industrious,” and even “conscientious;” see under that adjectival form in Liddell-Scott-Jones, Greek-English Lexicon (Oxford, The Clarendon Press, various editions). “To such a zealous group certain ecclesiastical duties could be assigned by a bishop.” (Young, “Zacharias,” 313 note # 3, with reference to PGL, 7th edition). 70 Trombley, Hellenic Religion, 29. The focus of this, and the study by Young, “Zacharias,” are complementary in that Trombley's concern is the survival of Hellenic belief in late antiquity, and Young is primarily interested in Zacharias and Severus as students of law who were becom- ing members of the church. H.I. MACADAM 215

Phoenicia, or to its namesake counterpart in Egypt (today a suburb of Cairo), someone of Armenian background is most likely to be from the cult-center in Phoenicia. Zacharias informs us that the Egyptian student (from Thebes) named John “the Fuller” became infatuated with a local lady who showed not the slightest interest in him. With the help of his societal brethren John conceived a plan by which his own Ethiopian slave would be offered as a living sacrifice to the Dark Powers.71 This would have the desired effect, he hoped, of securing the lady's atten- tions (Vie 58). At the midnight hour, in the lightless recesses of Beirut's great hippodrome, the “Magical Society” convened for the ritual murder.72 At the last moment a band of late-night revelers interrupted the planned sacrifice. John's slave “escaped from their murderous hands,” and raised the alarm by alerting “a friend of his master, an upright Christian and (one who) feared the judgment of God” (Vie 59). In the ensuing investigation the student “dormitories” were raided. John's room yielded a collection of magical texts with drawings of demons. These had been hidden beneath the seat of a chair, but their whereabouts were dis- closed by the Ethiopian slave. Some of these works were attributed to Ma- netho (of Egypt), others to “Ostanes the magician,” still others to Zarathustra (of Persia). All were consigned to the flames (Vie pp. 61-62). Attention then shifted from the students to their teacher Leontius, who was known to have interests in horoscopes and predicting the future, as well as a proclivity to idolatry. On one occasion, it was said, he had foretold the correct sex of an unborn child. Such a reputation lent itself readily to the scandal at hand, and Leontius was immediately linked to the students' activities: The entire city was in an uproar, because many [students] had studied works of magic instead of applying themselves to law, and because Leontius… had contributed to their wrong by his paganism (Vie 66).

A court of inquiry was then convened by the city's religious and civil au- thorities. The Bishop of Beirut, a municipal magistrate, and several clerks pre- sided. Eventually Leontius and a number of his students were convicted of

71 The tradition of slaves accompanying students to institutions of higher learning is not lim- ited to antiquity. Within the U.S.A. it survived until the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861. For an example of that custom then practiced, see John C. Inscoe, “Fatherly Advice on Succession: Edward Jones Erwin to His Son at Davidson College [North Carolina], 1860-61,” American Presbyterians 69 (1991) 97-108, esp. 97 and note #1. 72 Associated with the Beirut hippodrome is an inscribed lead plaque found near there in the 1920s. Some 40 lines of Greek text (including the names of 35 horses belong to the “Blue,” i.e. imperial, faction) witness to occult practices engaged in by one (or some) devotees of the races. Nine lines of text contain the names of demons evoked, and another six list recommendations made to the infernal powers. See AE (1931) 84; cf. Mouterde, Regards sur Beyrouth 40. 216 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL practicing or promulgating magic and generally engaging in un-Christian behavior. The sentence was banishment and many fled the city. But those who defied the order attempted to win over the general populace. The authorities preempted that by threatening a peasant uprising in the city's agricultural hinterland (Vie 68). Such an opéra-bouffé atmosphere may at first seem contrived, but Procopius is our witness to similar scenes (in Con- stantinople) during the reign of Justinian (527-565). No sooner had the furor surrounding this embarrassing and entirely un- savory incident subsided than yet another manifestation of odd, occult beha- vior surfaced, one which made the midnight-sacrifice tableau seem but a cur- tain-raiser. Once again it is the detailed and colorful account that Zacharias provides (in his Life of Severus) to which we must turn. A band of itinerant magicians (today's “Gypsies”) arrived in Beirut with news that a fabulous treasure once belonging to Darius, the “Great King” of Persia, lay buried within the city. The allure of such a prize compelled some residents (including a law school student from Asia Minor and two local priests) to join forces with the “gypsies” and search for the treasure. Interest centered on the cemetery near an unidentified martyrion. A noctur- nal “excavation” of several tombs was planned. To ensure the safety of this enterprise, and to elicit the aid (or perhaps to neutralize the effects) of evil sea- side spirits who guarded the treasure, it was deemed necessary to purloin cer- tain altar equipment for use in a ceremony. The priests thereupon provided a censer and other implements: [But] at the very moment when the magician began his diabolical evocation and produced the censer, the God of Martyrs punished these people. He made the ground tremble under their feet to the point that it nearly frightened every- one to death (Vie 72). The proceedings were abruptly terminated when this unexpected but appar- ently not disastrous earthquake rumbled through the city.73 The band of “gyp- sies” thereupon disappeared, and the silver altar-objects with them. The law student, identified by Zacharias as Chrysaorius, also fled from the city. Justice was once again quickly dispensed. The priests bore the full brunt of the law; one was sentenced to a monastery. Chrysaorius, a central figure in this caper, “bought" himself back into the city (and–presumably–into the school) “at the price of a lot of gold” (Vie 73). His punishment came later. When he completed his studies he placed his law books, his silver objets d'art, his children and their mother, his mistress, aboard a boat bound for his 73 Earthquakes at Beirut were frequent in late antiquity; for an account of the period under discussion, see Jean Plassard, “Crises séismique au Liban du IVème au VIème siècle,” MUSJ 44 (1968) 9-20. For recent archaeological evidence specific to central Beirut, see M. Saghieh- Beidoun, “Evidence of Earthquakes in the Current Excavations of Beirut City Center,” NMN 1 (1997) 15-20. H.I. MACADAM 217 homeland. He himself traveled by land. The boat and its cargo were never seen again (Vie 74-75).74

LEONTIUS THE PATRICIUS

Zacharias went on to complete his law studies and informs us that he left his books and notes behind for students then entering the school at Beirut (Vie 91). There is no indication if that was a common practice or whether Zacharias simply saw such a charitable act as worthy of a pious Christian.75 For a time he considered joining a monastery. Instead he became an advocatus or lawyer (hence the nickname Scholastikos) at Constantinople. During his time there he wrote biographies of several holy men, including Severus, and an ecclesiastical history. But his attraction to the Church per- sisted and eventually he became bishop of Mytilene (527). Other sources attest that he was alive at the time of the Council of Constantinople in 536.76 Severus the hedonist became a convert to (Monophysite) Christianity and was baptized in the church of a namesake saint in Tripolis before his “gradua- tion” from the Beirut law school. The capstone of his career in the church was the Patriarchate of Antioch (512-518), obtained through imperial patronage. Zacharias' biography ends with Severus' appointment as Patriarch, but we know from other sources that his tenure in Antioch was terminated abruptly upon the accession of the strongly Orthodox Emperor Justin I. A period of ex- ile in Alexandria followed. Severus was ultimate excommunicated, ironically, at the same church council (536) that was attended by his friend Zacharias.77 There is nothing known about Leontius the Magister to suggest that either his paganism or his predilection for magical practices hindered his later career. Threats to his life during the riots that followed the events described above persuaded the university and city authorities to allow Leontius to flee Beirut.

74 Shipwreck in the Mediterranean has been a common motif in literature from Homer through St. Paul. For aspects of sailing and its dangers along the ancient Lebanese coast see J. Rougé, “Romans, grecs et navigation: le voyage de Leucippé et Clitophon de Beyrouth en Egypte,” Archaeonautica 2 (1978) 265-280. 75 Books of any kind were expensive in antiquity, and it is reasonable to assume that “text- books” used at the Roman Law School in Beirut (or at any of the other legal centers) were sold or given to incoming students for as long as a “volume” was usable. McNamee notes (“Scholia” 275 and note # 27) a passage in Libanius (Epist. 1539) suggesting that the “professors of law at Beirut may have been involved in securing law books for their students.” 76 PLRE II s.v. “Zacharias 4.” The date of his death is uncertain; see Honigmann, Patristic Studies 204 note # l. 77 However their careers ended, those of Zacharias and Severus personify the common prac- tice at the time of transitioning from the study of law to a life in the church. On that “career change” see Jean Gaudemet, “L'apport du droit Romain à la Patristique Latine du VIe siècle,” Miscellanea Historiae Ecclesiasticae 6 (1983) 165-181. In medieval Europe a similar practice led high-ranking churchmen (often of “cardinal” status) to become ministers of state. 218 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL

A timely conversion to Christianity assured his reinstatement in the law school (Vie 73), with which he remained associated until about 500. He then became, as noted above, Praefectus Praetorio of the East. The dates are uncer- tain, but sometime in the early sixth century, before the death of Anastasius in 518, seems reasonable. Under Justinian, in 528, Leontius was commissioned to assist in the prepa- ration of the first Code. At that point he is styled as ex praefecto praetorio, but as also holding the even more prestigious post of . His titles eventually included consularis (honorary) and patricius. His death occurred within the next few years.78 However high the regard in which he was held, Leontius wasn't later counted among the most revered of the law school faculty. Kathleen McNamee notes that the 10th-century Basilica, an annotated summary of Justinian's great codification of Roman law, fails to include him: The Basilica transmit reliably only the names of five professors from Bei- rut's golden age of legal studies: Cyril, Domninus, Demosthenes, Eudoxius and Patricius–but they describe these five in [laudatory] language that is striking even by Byzantine standards.79

The effusive doxology (in Greek) includes “heroes,” “teachers of rare dis- tinction” and “teachers of the entire world.” Since the inclusive period was the entire fifth century (or most certainly the years 410-500), we must suspect that Leontius' omission was deliberate, and that his distinguished later career did not totally obscure his prior association with the rowdy students at the law school in the closing decades of the fifth century.

THE DEMISE OF THE LAW SCHOOL

For those who believed in portentous or ominous warnings, the tales of such bizarre adventures associated with faculty and students of the law school, cul- minating in seismic shocks, would have seemed a premonition of that institu- tion's, and indeed Beirut's, not-so-distant future. All of Phoenicia lay along what today's seismologists call a “fault-line,” or earthquake zone. Graeco-Roman and Syriac sources, and sometimes epigra- phy,80 witness to damage and devastation visited upon cities and regions by

78 Histoire 149-154; see the career outline for “Leontius (23)” in PLRE II 672-673, which omits reference to this book by Collinet. 79 McNamee, “Scholia,” 271. 80 For a recent example of a Byzantine-era earthquake in the interior of the Levant, see Fawzi Zayadine, “Un séisme à Rabbat Moab (Jordanie) d'après une inscription grecque du VIe siècle,” Berytus 20 (1971) 139-141, which records restoration of an earthquake-damaged building in A.D. 597/598. H.I. MACADAM 219 seismic activity. Numerous shocks along the coast are recorded from late Hel- lenistic times through the Islamic conquest.81 But none was more destructive than the series of earthquakes which struck the Syro-Phoenician coast in the Byzantine period: those of 306, 349, 494 and 502 are especially noteworthy.82 Yet even their collective damage was but a prelude to the great seismic catastrophe that struck a half-century later, an earthquake so powerful that it may have caused a break in the famous Marib Dam in the interior of the Arabian Peninsula.83 Early in the sixth decade of the sixth century (the traditional date is 9 July 551) the entire Syro-Phoenician coast and a large portion of the interior Levant felt the effects of a truly massive earthquake. This was accompanied by an equally powerful undersea shock which forced a gigantic wave of water (tsu- nami) to slam into the coast. Earthquake activity was hardly new to the inhabitants of Phoenicia but one of this magnitude had never before been experienced. Beirut was devastated, first by the seismic shock itself, then by fires which followed. The port area must have been damaged by the tsunami. Tremors from this quake felled buildings as far inland as central Jordan.84 The various accounts of this have been collected, translated and commented upon by John Pairman Brown.85 The most succinct account of the damage to Beirut is given by Agathias (c.536-c.600), an eyewitness to the effects of the 551 earthquake in Alexandria and the Aegean: About the same time [as the Ostrogothic War of 554], in the season of sum- mer, there was a great earthquake in Byzantium and elsewhere in the empire of the Romans, and as a result many cities both on islands and on the main- land were overthrown, and their inhabitants wiped out. And most handsome Berytus, until then the jewel of Phoenicia, was completely defaced: famous

81 D.H.K. Amiran, “A Revised Earthquake-Catalogue of Palestine (I),” IEJ l (1950/51) 223- 246; idem. “A Revised Earthquake Catalogue of Palestine (II),” IEJ 2 (1952) 48-62. Portions of that have been revised in K.W. Russell, “The Earthquake Chronology of Palestine and Northwest Arabia from the 2nd through the mid-8th Century A.D.,” BASOR 260 (1985) 37-59. Neither gives much attention, inevitably, to earthquake activity along the Phoenician coast except for the great quake of summer, 551 (see in particular Russell, “Earthquake Chronology” 44-46). 82 For a detailed account of seismic activity in Byzantine Phoenicia see J. Plassard, “Crises séismique au Liban du IVe au VIe Siècle,” MUSJ 44 (1968) 9-20, esp. 12-13 for the quakes of 349, 494 and 502. For the quake of 306 see Russell, “Earthquake Chronology” 42. The quake of 494, which affected Sidon and Tyre more than Beirut, has been associated with the earth tremor described by Zacharias, Vie de Sévère 72 (see above). But there are chronological problems with such an association (see e.g. Collinet, Histoire 55 and note # 5). 83 I hope to investigate this possibility in a separate study for al-Abhath (forthcoming). 84 S. Thomas Parker, The Roman Frontier in Central Jordan II (Oxford, British Archaeologi- cal Reports, 1987) 819-823. 85 The Lebanon and Phoenicia: Ancient Texts Illustrating their Physical Geography and Na- tive Industries Vol. I: The Physical Setting and the Forest (Beirut, The American University of Beirut, 1969) 126-139, omitted in the article by Russell cited above. 220 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL and renowned ornaments of buildings were overthrown, so that almost nothing was left, or at most their foundations. A large number of natives and foreigners died, killed by the weight of de- bris; including many young men from abroad of good family and good educa- tion, who were [in Beirut] to learn the laws of the Romans. Education is the ancestral tradition of the city; such studies as have been granted her as the greatest boon. Thereupon the professors of law moved to the neighboring city of Sidon, and their classrooms (phrontisteria) were transferred there until Berytus should be rebuilt.86

Other accounts add bits and pieces of detail: Michael the Syrian relates that an earthquake-related fire in Beirut burned all that summer; Pseudo-Dionysus notes that the principal aqueduct into the city had been toppled. Twenty years later an anonymous Christian pilgrim en route from Constantinople to Jerusa- lem passed along the Phoenician coast: From there [i.e. the northern cities] we came to the most splendid city Berytus, in which recently letters were studied [studium fuit litterarum]. This city was overthrown. The Bishop of the city told me that from among persons known [to him] by name, excluding [resident] foreigners, at least 30,000 died…87

Beirut recovered with the help of imperial donations. The law school did not. The sources are silent about it after the “temporary relocation” in Sidon. But it would be unwise to conclude that the imperial authorities simply de- cided that it had outlived its usefulness. There are no indications in the genera- tion or two before the catastrophe of 551 that the school was in a period of decline or neglect due to economic or academic difficulties. Perhaps its closure was no more than a question of priorities in the after- math of calamitous natural destruction, damage that affected more than just the cities of the Levant. Certainly the vitality and viability of Beirut lay in its role as an emporium and efforts to resuscitate the city and its port were made with that in mind. Consequently the law school may have been regarded as an expensive con- cession to intellect, which the imperial treasury could no longer afford. It be- came, in a word, a liability–not just to an act of nature, but to the nearly bank- rupt fiscal situation that obtained in the 550s and after as a result of Justinian's grandiose building program and a series of costly wars to bring the western provinces back within the Byzantine empire.88

86 Agathias, History 2.l5-16 = Brown, Lebanon & Phoenicia I 129-130. 87 All three texts are conveniently translated with commentary in Brown, Lebanon & Phoe- nicia I 131-137. 88 A.E.R. Boak & W.G. Sinnigen, A History of Rome to A.D. 5655 (New York, MacMillan, 1967) 489-495. There is some evidence that the law school at Constantinople was closed at or near the death of Justinian (in 565). See Scheltema, “Byzantine Law” 58. H.I. MACADAM 221

It remains to assess the impact on Phoenicia of the law school and its Latin civic matrix, Colonia Iulia Augusta Felix Berytus. Phoenicia had never be- come, even after seven centuries (63 B.C.-A.D. 636) of continuous Roman/ Byzantine rule, a provincia togata, a thoroughly Romanized province, in the way that Gaul and Spain did as early as the Augustan period. But Beirut itself could certainly be described as an insula togata within the Semitic but Hellenized east–i.e. Syria, Arabia and Judaea–the only Phoenician city whose “Roman-ness” was as visibly evident as that of King Herod's (and then Rome's) Caesaraea Maritima to the south. Its sister-colony at Heliopolis, rather than being a separate entity, was the inland, cultic extension of Beirut–at least until the third century.89 The military background of Beirut's early Roman history was a large factor in this sustained Romanitas, and that became part of its treasured tradition of Latin identity. But the law school itself was the single most prominent aspect of that Latinitas, the one specific quality that set the city apart from all other Roman foundations. It was that institution and its empire-wide reputation that sustained the Ro- man identity of Beirut long after its military foundations had become a distant memory and the Greek/Christian aspect of late antiquity obscured the city's long and close association with Rome. The city that arose from the ashes of the ruinous earthquake of 551 managed to recreate some of its previous mu- nicipal appearance. But the loss of its school of law must have seemed to some survivors the real end of an era, the final severance of a long, valued relationship. Yet even though Beirut never regained its former prominence as a center of commercial activity, it did not completely lose its identity as a school of law. Early in the era to follow, which began with the Arab Islamic conquest of 636 and after, at least one teacher of law was resident there (see the Postscript below).

POSTSCRIPT

When a small Italian force entered Beirut during the winter of 1982/83 as part of a United Nations peacekeeping force, it marked, as far as I know, the first time since the early reign of Augustus that military personnel were di- rected to that city through an administrative decision made by a political leader in Rome and approved by the Roman Senate. The Italian forces, along with contingent troops from the U.S.A. and France, remained in Beirut about eighteen months. During that time they established

89 “It should be accepted beyond all doubt that in the first two centuries Heliopolis was a place (however described), and a rapidly-evolving cult center, in the territory of Berytus” (Millar, “The Roman Coloniae” 19). 222 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL direct and friendly contact with the local political leaders in their sector of the city. The Italians set up a field hospital in which they treated ailments of all kinds, ranging from conjunctivitis to shrapnel wounds, all the while providing medical advice to the general public. French and American forces, represent- ing greater military powers, attempted to arbitrate and mediate among the con- tending Lebanese factions. It was not surprising to me or to any of my colleagues and friends at the A.U.B., that the French and Americans eventually found themselves en- trenched and barricaded within their sectors of Beirut, and gradually acknowl- edging that they were, in fact, in a state of siege within a city they had entered to help encourage and enforce the process of peace. The tragic culmination of that state of affairs was the truck-bombing of the U.S. marine barracks near Beirut airport in October, 1983, following the de- struction of the U.S. embassy in April, and after an earthquake (that measured 6.0 on the Richter Scales) had struck the city in June. Political disasters on ei- ther side of a natural disturbance seemed to indicate that the situation in Beirut and in Lebanon was not about to improve rapidly. The French and American forces were subsequently withdrawn from duty, somewhat hastily and awkwardly. When the Italian forces were ordered to leave Beirut, I went to the airport to watch them depart on transport planes. There were no dry eyes among the Lebanese families whom they had assisted, now sorry beyond words to see them go. On the way back to the A.U.B., still near the airport and the beaches, I could see from my service-taxi the slender minaret of the tiny, seventh-century mosque named for al-Imam Abdurrahman ibn-‘Amr al-Awza‘i (707-774), who was born in Ba‘albek and who had become one of early Islam's most re- spected and revered jurisconsultants.90 Awza‘i had a special affection for the ancient village of Hantus, now long beneath the modern suburb of Beirut, and until his death he taught Muslim law in the mosque that still stands there: Tradition tells us that an attempt was made to bury him in Beirut proper, but that unseen forces prevented the bearers of his coffin from advancing within a number of yards of the prepared grave. Likewise, says the same tradi- tion, when the Imam's body was [later] placed on the ground just east of the protruding mihrab, or Mecca-oriented niche, outside the south wall of the mosque [in Hantus], it became a heavy stone and could not be moved, so that a stone tomb was built over and around it in A.H. 157 (A.D. 774).91

90 In that respect al-Awza‘i carried on a long-established tradition in Beirut. Rey-Coquais, “Syrie romaine” 67 notes that an unpublished (and unfortunately undated) Greek inscription from Beirut honors M. Aurelius Cassianus, city-councillor from Gerasa (Jerash, in modern Jor- dan) and jurisconsultant to the governor. 91 Bruce deBourbon Condé, See Lebanon (Beirut, Harb Bijani Press, 1960) 22-27 at 24. H.I. MACADAM 223

Hantus was later destroyed by yet another earthquake, but its mosque was spared, and when the village was rebuilt it took the name Awza‘i from the fa- mous judge who had been buried there. I reflected that day that there were probably few in the Lebanese capital, as Italian forces withdrew, who might recall the long and special relationship between Rome and Beirut centered on the school of law that had flourished there for 400 years. Perhaps some in Beirut could associate the name al-Awza‘i with the special distinction he had brought to the city during the time when early Islamic law was being formulated. For the few who did remember, it was a recollection I hoped would be seasoned with gentle irony. As one Lebanese inhabitant had told me rather ruefully at the outbreak of civil war: Mafi kanûn bil Lubnan (“there is no law in Lebanon”). So it must have seemed. But out of the ashes of that civil war, now a decade in the past, a new phoenix arises which brings Phoenicia's heritage into the new millennium.

APPENDIX A: RECENT ARCHAEOLOGY IN BEIRUT

As noted above, large-scale destruction in downtown Beirut during the civil war (1975-1991) has made systematic excavations (largely of the “rescue ar- chaeology” type) possible. For the first time since antiquity, a portion of Bei- rut's traditional commercial center near the ancient port has been the focus of an international effort to map, photograph, excavate and record what can be recovered of the city between prehistory and present. Plans and layouts of the modern city of Beirut in any publications prior to the 1980s are to some degree superseded by recent topographical plans of Beirut made during post-civil war excavations. For a report on that see Kevin Butcher, “From Ptolemy to Justinian: The Evolution of an Urban Land- scape,” Archéologie et Patrimoine # 4 (1996) 212-214. But by no means are older maps of Beirut useless, as was shown clearly by Michael Davie, “Maps and the Historical Topography of Beirut,” Berytus 35 (1987) 141-164, esp. at p. 143. For a popular account of the “rescue-type” archaeology in Beirut see now Beirut: Urban Archaeology ‘94 (Excavations of the Souk Area), Beirut, Direc- torate General of Antiquities, 1995) as well as John Carswell, “Beirut: The Future of the Past,” NMN 9 (1999) 19-22 and C. Aubert & P. Neury, “Une Methode de Conservation au Centre Ville: Le Quartier Hellénistique,” NMN 9 (1999) 29-33. A new publication of the Department of Antiquities which made its debut after the war is Bulletin d'Archéologie et d'Architecture Libanaises (BAAL), which published its first reports in 1996. An overview of what new archaeol- ogy had been undertaken to that date was given by Camille Asmar, “Les 224 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL fouilles du Centre-Ville de Beyrouth,” BAAl 1 (1996) 7-13. That was followed by a comprehensive report by Leila Badre, “Excavations of the American Uni- versity of Beirut Museum 1993-1996” BAAL 2 (1997) 6-94. A parallel summary but more specific is Kevin Butcher and Reuben Thorpe, “A Note on Excavations in Central Beirut 1994-96,” JRA 10 (1997) 291- 306 which emphasized for readers of that journal the Roman/Byzantine re- mains. More inclusive was Chris Cumberpatch, “Archaeology in the : Some Notes and Observations,” Berytus 42 (1995-96) 157- 172. Important for an understanding of how the central water supply to Roman Berytus functioned via the aqueducts and channels feeding the city is Michael Davie, Yasmine Makaroun and Lévon Nordiguian, “Les Qanater Zubaydé et l'alimentation en eau de Beyrouth et de ses environs à l'époque romaine,” BAAL 2 (1997) 262-289. That is linked to a study of one newly-discovered Roman/Byzantine bathing complex (partial) by Reuben Thorpe, “Transfor- mation: The Life and Death of a Hot Bath in Beirut,” available on-line at http://www.shef.ac.uk/~assem/4/4rxt.html (I owe that reference to Linda Hall). Recent Roman-Byzantine era epigraphic finds were announced by Chaker Ghadban, “Trois nouvelles inscriptions latines de Beyrouth,” BAAL 2 (1997) 206-235 and by Jean-Paul Rey-Coquais, “Inscriptions grecques et latines au Musée National de Beyrouth,” NMN 7 (1998) 32-36. Phoenician epigraphy was reported by Hélène Sader, “Phoenician Inscriptions from Beirut” in Leo- nard H. Lesko (ed.), Ancient Egyptian and Mediterranean Studies in Memory of William A. Ward (Providence, RI., Brown University Press, 1998) 203- 213. Discoveries centered on ceramics are summarized by Jeremy Evans, “Is- lamic and Roman-Period Pottery–Preliminary Report,” BAAL 1 (1996) 218- 223. Glassware is reported on by Sarah Jennings, “The Roman and Early Byz- antine Glass from the Souks Excavation: An Interim Statement,” Berytus 43 (1997/98) 111-146. Mosaics finds are noted by Chuck Morss, “Beirut Souks: The Byzantine Mosaic Floors,” Berytus 43 (1997/98) 167-172 and a detailed study of one already known is given by Olivier Wattel de Croizant, “Les ‘Amours des Dieux' sur la mosaïque du Musée National de Beyrouth,” NMN 4 (1996) 26-36. The whole of Berytus 43 (1997/1998) includes reports on recent excavation in the downtown area, from which I have selected above the subjects relevant to this paper. That issue contains as well a CD-ROM color supplement con- taining 160 color images essential for illustrating some of the finds described in several of those articles. An index for the CD is given on pp. 258-262 and includes glass, mosaics, geomorphology, Ottoman material and a seal of Ramses IV. H.I. MACADAM 225

APPENDIX B: DID THE GOSPEL OF MARK ORIGINATE IN BEIRUT?

Joel Marcus has recently reassessed the question of where the Gospel of Mark was written, and for a number of reasons (eschatological emphasis, Jew- ish-Gentile tensions depicted, messianic tendencies, and the impact of the Jew- ish War) argued that the context of Mark is far better suited to be “in temporal and geographical proximity to the events of the Jewish War, probably in Syria… we might even think specifically of Pella.”92 Locating “Mark's community” other than at Rome is still a minority opin- ion, but as Marcus notes, a “growing minority” of NT scholars are now look- ing elsewhere. The traditional view is based on the Latinisms in Mark (Latin terms transliterated into Greek, or Latin expressions translated into Greek), and the association of Mark with Peter the apostle (presumably in Rome) on the basis of the late testimony of an early church commentator, and some allu- sions in Mark 13 to persecution of the Christian community. That is hardly compelling evidence. The Latin-background character of Mark's composition (the terms used more often than not have a military as- pect), and the emphasis on Phoenician territory in one of that Gospel's most compelling incidents, add much weight to Marcus' well-argued reasons for the provenance of Mark in a region contiguous to Palestine. A brief examination of that incident (Mark 7:24-30–noted above) will suffice. Jesus is said to have traveled into the “neighborhood (Gr. horia) of Tyre” for the specific purpose of avoiding the demands of crowds. Tyre's inland territorium extended into the hills above the Huleh Valley, and was therefore contiguous with Upper Galilee, the scene of Jesus' activity just prior to this side-trip. We know from Josephus that the villages of Baca (Jewish War 3.3.1-39) and Kedasa (OT Kadesh) belonged to Tyre, and it may well have been that the incident describe by Mark took place in or near one of them.93 Also notewor- thy is that this incident is particular to Mark; though borrowed into the Gospel of Matthew (see below), it is not found in Luke or John. Its importance here is in no way dependent on its historical veracity. There Jesus was “discovered” by a non-Jewish woman who pleaded with him to cure her daughter of an unspecified illness. Mark's particular identifica- tion of the woman as “a Greek, a Syro-phoenician by birth” makes sense only if the community to which his gospel was directed was nearby. Matthew's par-

92 J. Marcus, “The Jewish War and the Sitz im Leben of Mark,” JBL 111 (1992) 441-462 at 460-461. 93 Josephus refers to “Kadasa belonging to Tyre (BJ 2.18.1) and in another passage describes it as”a strong inland village of the Tyrians, always engaged in bitter strife with the Galilaeans“(BJ 4.2.3). On recent archaeological work at Kedesh (on the Israelis side of the Leba- nese-Israeli border) see Millar, Roman Near East 293 and note # 31. 226 STUDIA ET CIRCENSES: BEIRUT'S ROMAN LAW SCHOOL IN ITS COLONIAL allel (not independent) version (Matthew 11:21-28) of the incident is also striking because in it the woman becomes “a Canaanite.” Mark's account of this woman's ethnicity is specific, Matthew's is more general. This can only mean that the community for which Mark wrote would be able to distinguish clearly what was meant by Syrophoinikassa– and there- fore that community must be very close at hand to the geography of that event. Matthew's community (traditionally located at Antioch-on-the Orontes in northwestern Syria), wouldn't require such ethnic precision. For a Christian community as far away as Rome, distinguishing someone as a Greek-speaking “Syrophoenician” would be a totally unnecessary detail. For a Christian community in the coastal city of Beirut, many of whom would be themselves Phoenician by birth, that distinction makes good sense: the re- sourceful woman of Mark 7:26-30 was an “inland” Phoenician, someone whose community lay in the border area of Tyrian territory close to Upper Galilee.94

ABBREVIATIONS

AE = Année Epigraphique BAAL = Bulletin d'Archéologie et d'Architecture Libanaises BAR = British Archaeological Reports BASOR = Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research CIL = Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum IEJ = Israel Exploration Journal IGLS = Inscriptions Greques et Latines de la Syrie ILS = Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae JBL = Journal of Biblical Literature JRA = Journal of Roman Archaeology JRS = Journal of Roman Studies MUSJ = Mélanges de l'Université Saint-Joseph NJBC = New Jerome Biblical Commentary NMN = National Museum News (Beirut) NT = New Testament ODCC = Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church OT = Old Testament PGL = Patristic Greek Lexicon PLRE = Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire PO = Patrologia Orientalis RMP = Rheinisches Museum für Philologie ROC = Revue de l'Orient Chrètien SEG = Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum ZDPV = Zeitschrift des deutschen Palästina-Vereins ZPE = Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik

94 There are other details which point to a Hellenized community with a strong Latin aspect in close proximity to Palestine. I will discuss these in a forthcoming article.