H7? 
 
 BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME 
 FROM THE 
 
 SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND 
 
 THE GIFT OF 
 
 Henry W. Sage 
 1891 
 
BR1390 C H74" U " iversity Ubtar * 
 
 EX lSffiB,.aI,„te..C(ir!s«an churches 
 
 olin 
 
 3 1924 029 275 
 
 398 
 
The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924029275398 
 
THE EXTINCTION 
 
 OF THE 
 
 CHKISTIAN CHUKCHES 
 
 NORTH AFEICA. 
 
Catntort&jje: 
 
 PRINTED BY j. & c. P. CLAY, 
 AT THE UNIVERSITY PBESS. 
 
THE EXTINCTION 
 
 OP THE 
 
 CHRISTIAN CHURCHES 
 
 IN 
 
 NOKTH AFRICA. 
 
 HULSEAN PRIZE ESSAY, 1895. 
 
 L: R. HOLME, B.A., 
 
 FORMERLY SCHOLAR OF JESUS COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE; 
 
 LECTURER ON POLITICAL SCIENCE, ECONOMICS, ETC., IN THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF BISHOP'S COLLEGE, LENNOXVILLE, P.Q. CANADA. 
 
 London: 
 
 C. J. CLAY AND SONS, 
 
 CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PBESS WAREHOUSE, 
 
 AVE MARIA LANE. 
 
 1898 
 
 [All Rights reserved.] 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 TN breaking ground almost untrodden by modern 
 writers I have met with many difficulties, especially 
 in finding sources of information. In overcoming these 
 I have to acknowledge much kind assistance, without 
 which indeed this essay could never have been under- 
 taken or brought to a conclusion. Mr Thomas Hodgkin, 
 D.C.L., and the late Comte de Mas Latrie both shewed 
 the utmost kindness in answering the letters of a 
 beginner in the art of which they were masters. The 
 Kev. H. B. Swete, D.D., Eegius Professor of Divinity 
 in the University of Cambridge, was kind enough to 
 give much valuable advice and the Kev. W. Cunning- 
 ham, D.D., of Trinity College, Cambridge, and Mr James 
 Kennedy of the East India Club, referred me to in- 
 formation I should not otherwise have obtained. 
 
 The Rev. Professor Parrock, M.A., of the University 
 of Bishop's College, Lennoxville, Province of Quebec, 
 and my brother Mr T. W. Holme of New College, Oxford 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 have also examined authorities which were beyond my 
 reach. 
 
 I must also especially thank the Rev. Abbe" La- 
 flamme, Rector of Laval University, Quebec, for 
 allowing me the use of the University Library for 
 an extended period during my residence in Quebec. 
 
 But above all I have to thank the Rev. F. J. Foakes 
 Jackson, M.A., Fellow and Dean of my own College. 
 Without his kind encouragement I should never have 
 entered upon this subject, and, when my absence from 
 England prevented the proper consultation of authori- 
 ties, he rendered me every assistance in his power. 
 Finally he undertook the revision of the essay and 
 at the cost of great labour to himself has most kindly 
 prepared it for the press. 
 
 Bishop's College, 
 Lennoxville, P.Q., Canada, 
 June, 1898. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter I. Introduction . 
 
 Chapter II. The African Church to 398 a.d. 
 
 Chapter III. The Golden Age of the African 
 Church .... 
 
 Chapter IV. The Rise of the Vandals 
 
 Chapter V. The Reign of Hunneric . 
 
 Chapter VI. The Decline and Fall of the Vandals 
 
 Chapter VII. From Justinian to the Saracens 
 
 Chapter VIII. The End of African Christianity 
 
 Chapter IX. Conclusion . 
 
 Authors and "Works Quoted . 
 
 Index 
 
 Map 
 
 PAGE 
 
 1—21 
 22—53 
 
 54—75 
 76—118 
 119—147 
 148—167 
 168—210 
 211—242 
 243—255 
 257—259 
 261—263 
 
To /ace page 7. 
 
 ^ 
 
 Carl,; 
 
 Malagas 
 
 Gibraltar (Br^ 
 
 «. 
 
 
 
 'ALb.visan I, 
 
 /Sp. 
 
 MT. Gat 
 
 -£fc 
 
 '£„ 
 
 
 (ammo 
 itzr 
 
 a uela 
 
 » 
 
 
 
 
 Uqieral \\J'ulaL 
 let JJiedoiS^ ICadAuxti 
 
 XL 
 
 'sa^" Vz aAUhj, 
 
 4° 
 
 Long: V1T. of (Jr 
 
 Scale of English Mes 
 
 o so 100 
 
THE EXTINCTION 
 
 OF THE CHKISTIAN CHURCHES 
 
 IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Introduction. 
 
 The problem presented by the decline and fall of 
 the Churches of North Africa is at once most in- 
 teresting and most difficult. It is interesting because 
 the Church of Carthage, formerly the most flourishing, 
 the most earnest, and the most enlightened of all the 
 communions of the world, has to-day perished and 
 hardly left a trace behind. Yet it met with no trials 
 that other Churches did not successfully overcome. 
 The Copts, the Abyssinians, the Armenians, the 
 Spaniards were all subdued by the Saracens, and yet 
 all preserved their faith, even though in a debased 
 form. The Africans, also, at one time seemed to be 
 far more likely than these to withstand the attacks 
 of the infidel. No one could accuse them of luke- 
 warmness ; their earnestness was almost fanatical and 
 led them into dangers unknown to the careless. On 
 H. 1 
 
2 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 the other hand heresy never attracted the Africans. If 
 Pelagianism for a time gained some foothold, St Augus- 
 tine rooted it out ; if Manichaeism had its votaries, they 
 did not get much power; and on the whole no Church was 
 more orthodox than that of Carthage. In the fifth 
 century the Pelagians, in the seventh the Monothelites 
 were opposed by the great mass of the people, and 
 when the controversy of the " Three Chapters " arose 
 the doughtiest champions of the Council of Chalcedon 
 came from North Africa. Schism was indeed the 
 great foe of the African Christians; but their prone- 
 ness to schism attests the earnestness of their belief. 
 
 Moreover not only did Carthage escape many of 
 the dangers which beset other communions; it conferred 
 many great benefits upon them. The effect of the 
 work or writings of such men as Tertullian, Cyprian, 
 Lactantius and Arnobius was not confined to the African 
 church, but was coextensive with Christianity. Momm- 
 sen and Milman both bear witness to the important 
 part that the Church in Africa played in forming the 
 received docrine of the Catholic Church. In his 
 ' Roman Provinces,' the great German scholar says 1 , 
 " In the development of Christianity, Africa plays the 
 first part ; if it arose in Syria, it was in and through 
 Africa that it became the religion of the world." Dean 
 Milman adds his testimony 2 ; — " Africa, not Rome, gave 
 birth to Latin Christianity. Tertullian was the first 
 Latin writer, at least the first who commanded the 
 public ear; and there is strong ground for supposing 
 that, since Tertullian quotes the sacred writings per- 
 petually and copiously, the earliest of those many 
 
 1 Vol. n. p. 343 (Eng. Tram.). " Latin Christianity, i. 35. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 3 
 
 Latin versions noticed by Augustine and on which 
 Jerome grounded his Vulgate were African. Cyprian 
 kept up the tradition of ecclesiastical Latin. Arnobius, 
 too, was an African." 
 
 Yet this Church has perished so completely that 
 the very causes of its ruin have disappeared. For the 
 great wave of the Mahommedan invasion of Africa 
 swept away in its course every record of the last 
 centuries of Eoman rule, and after Procopius no contem- 
 porary historian seems to have dealt expressly with the 
 affairs of the Province. Only most careful research is 
 able to discover the faintest indications as to the real 
 state of the African Church after the re-conquest of 
 the province under Justinian. The historian of to-day 
 must piece his story together from the most diverse 
 sources; he must find the few facts recorded by the 
 Latin annalists ; he must seek for chance references 
 in contemporary literature ; and he must welcome as 
 important evidence admonitions addressed by the Popes 
 to this portion of their flock. The political events of the 
 time, and especially the Arabic accounts of the Moslem 
 victories, will throw some light on the fate of the 
 Church, and something may be learned from the monu- 
 ments and inscriptions that., remain. But when all 
 has been found that can be found and every particle 
 of information has been collected, the result will be 
 meagre in the extreme. It will be even impossible to 
 draw up a complete list of the Primates of Carthage 
 and only a guess at most can be hazarded at the true 
 cause of the disappearance of African Christianity. It 
 will seem that the Church perished because it was the 
 Church, not of the native population, but of the alien 
 
 1—2 
 
4 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 conquerors. If it took deep root it was not amongst 
 the indigenous peoples of N.-W. Africa, but amongst 
 the foreign immigrants and Roman officials. In fact, 
 if a Christian country can be defined as a country in 
 which the natives are converted, Africa was not Chris- 
 tian ; just as at the present day the Christianity of 
 British India hardly extends beyond the European 
 population, so in the Province the number of converted 
 Berbers, though proportionately larger, was still in- 
 significant compared with the mass of their heathen 
 kinsmen. Consequently it seems that the fortunes of 
 African Christianity were bound up with those of the 
 Roman domination ; as that failed, the Church grew 
 weaker, and when it perished, the Church too passed 
 away. The political power of the Empire in Africa 
 fell because the Roman population first dwindled, and 
 then fled away ; and the Christianity of the Province 
 was disintegrated and transplanted with it. 
 
 Roman Africa consisted of the districts now known 
 as Tripoli, Tunis, Algeria and Morocco. On the East 
 the almost impassable desert of Cyrene cut it off from 
 Egypt ; on the west it reached the Atlantic ; on the 
 south, its boundaries were ill-defined, but Rome 
 claimed at any rate a nominal suzerainty as far as 
 the northern limits of the Sahara. 
 
 The population of N. Africa has always been very 
 heterogeneous and the Roman province fully shared 
 this characteristic. The successive colonies, planted 
 by Phoenicians, Greeks and Romans, though they mixed 
 with each other, never united with the Moors or Ber- 
 bers whom they displaced. Long before any authentic 
 records were kept, a dark brown race appeared from 
 
INTRODUCTION. O 
 
 the east and south and a people of a lighter brown 
 from the north-west. These soon coalesced in the 
 Moorish people and their common language with its 
 written characters, which still exists, shews that in 
 historical times they had become one nation. Neither 
 the negroes of the Sahara nor the fair races of Europe 
 bear any ethnological likeness to the Moors, and their 
 nearest relations amongst other peoples seem to be the 
 Iberians of Spain. 
 
 The colonies, which lined the Mediterranean sea- 
 board, introduced a much more complex population. 
 The northern districts of Africa have always attracted 
 a, curious mixture of peoples, and from the earliest times 
 settlers of different nationalities took up their abode 
 there. Amongst the earliest to arrive were the Greeks, 
 who founded several cities in Cyrene and Tripoli. 
 However they left hardly any traces of their stay; 
 their civilisation passed away, and the only relics of 
 their former presence were the names of a few towns, 
 such as Megalopolis, Aphrodisium and Neapolis. 
 
 On the other hand the colonists from Phoenicia were 
 of supreme importance and moulded the destinies of 
 their adopted country for many centuries. Gades, their 
 first settlement, seems to date from almost prehistoric 
 times and was perhaps contemporaneous with the Fall 
 •of Troy. It is unlikely that they ever held much 
 inland territory or at first united with the Berber 
 population ; in the days when the man, who came to the 
 strong as the peaceful trader, became among weaker 
 tribes the cruel slave-dealer, friendly intercourse between 
 the new-comers and the old inhabitants was nearly un- 
 known. On the other hand, as centuries went by, the 
 
6 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 coast and sea-board of Africa was so thickly studded 
 with Phoenician settlements that in the Punic Wars 
 it seemed to the Roman statesmen that the conquest 
 of Carthage implied the subjugation of Africa; nor 
 was it until the arms of Scipio were crowned with 
 victory, that they perceived that in reality their work 
 was just begun. 
 
 The Phoenicians may not have been the only colonists 
 from Syria. Procopius tells a tale of a pillar set up to 
 commemorate the arrival of the Girgashites, fleeing 
 before the " robber Joshua 1 ," and Ibn Khaldoun, the 
 Arabic historian, gives a long list of Berber tribes of 
 Tripoli and Morocco, who observed the rites of the 
 Jewish religion 2 . Of course Jews were in Africa as 
 they were in all the world, and an inscription records 
 the presence of one of them in Mauritania Sitifiensis 3 - 
 But even if their presence were actually proved, none 
 of these peoples formed an important element in the 
 African population. Tissot however sees reason to 
 doubt the accuracy of Procopius ; and, as no writer but 
 Ibn Khaldoun, who lived five hundred years after the 
 event, mentions the Jewish Moors, it seems probable 
 that he has mistaken for Judaism some debased form of 
 Christianity. 
 
 Last and most important of all the great colonizing 
 peoples were the Romans. Brought across the sea by 
 their rivalry with Carthage, it was long before they 
 conquered the whole territory which formed the Pro- 
 vince of Africa. Like ourselves in India, they were 
 led on from conquest to conquest and from annexation 
 
 1 de bello Vandalico, ii. 10. 2 Slane's Translation, page 208 
 3 G. I. L. 8499. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 7 
 
 to annexation, until at length they reached what may 
 be called the ' scientific frontier.' At first they only 
 stepped in where Carthage had been before, and were 
 willing to set up native states under their suzerainty ; 
 but the civil wars at the rise of the Empire mark the 
 practical absorption of the whole of N.-W. Africa with 
 the provincial system. After that, one Roman general 
 after another gradually drove the Moors back, until 
 at the time of the Antonines, the Roman dominion 
 stretched, in name at least, from Tripoli to the Atlantic, 
 and from the Sahara to the Mediterranean. Practically, 
 however, the actual territory ruled from Carthage did 
 not extend further west than modern Algeria. There 
 were many Roman cities in Mauritania Tingitana, 
 which had been founded by Augustus and Claudius 
 for military and commercial reasons; but the moun- 
 tains that intervened practically cut them off altogether 
 from the rest of Africa. There was no road from 
 Caesarea to Tingi, and the 200 miles between the latter 
 and Russ-addir had to be travelled by sea. Consequently 
 Tingitana plays no part in the history of Africa and 
 indeed at a later time was counted part of Spain 1 . 
 
 The population of the province in the early years of 
 the fourth century when the Church first began to 
 fail, falls naturally into two great divisions. The 
 civilized Liby-Phoenicians inhabited the sea-coast from 
 Leptis to Caesarea and reached as far inland as a rough 
 line drawn from Caesarea through Mount Aurasius to 
 
 1 This account of Africa is based on Tissot, Ge"ographie comparee 
 de la province romaine d'Afrique, Vol. I. 2nd pt. Bk. I. ch. i. §§ 1, 2 ; 
 Gaston Boissier, L'Afrique romaine, ch. i. ; Mommsen, Provinces 
 from Caesar to Diocletian, ch. xiii. 
 
8 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Leptis. This triangle was shut in by the solid mass 
 of the Moors. The mountains of Mauritania, the 
 plateau of Aurasius, the deserts of Tripoli were in- 
 habited by wild and terrible hordes, who liked nothing 
 better than to burst forth and sweep far and wide over 
 the cultivated and peaceful lowlands. For Rome was 
 never secure in Africa ; at the very height of her power 
 she had to hold her ground by main force, and modern 
 researches have proved that the statements of the old 
 historians to this effect are true. From the first to 
 the last day of the Roman domination in Africa, the 
 Moors of the frontiers presented the greatest difficulty. 
 Wherever the French explorers of to-day penetrate 
 they find ruins of Roman forts, and that every strategic 
 position within the borders of the province was once 
 guarded and garrisoned by a vigilant force of soldiers 1 . 
 It is this which is the all-important fact in the history 
 of the Romans in Africa. Gorgeous in their splendour, 
 wonderful in their luxury, invincible in their strength 
 as the Roman Provinces seemed, their whole basis was 
 affected by inherent rottenness. For centuries their 
 foundation might seem firm; but sooner or later the 
 earthquake was sure to come and utterly destroy their 
 whole structure. 
 
 If the power of Rome had not failed when it did, if 
 the supremacy of her civilization had been extended for 
 several centuries, her hold on the African plains might 
 have been more secure. For in all probability the 
 difference between the Moorish barbarian of the 
 highlands and his half-civilized cousin of the lowlands 
 was very slight. As the latter lost his savagery under 
 
 1 Boissier, L'Afrique Romaine, iii. § 1. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 9 
 
 the influences of Christianity and civilization, the 
 former also would have been improved by the same 
 agencies until he settled down into a more peaceful and 
 settled condition. Unfortunately this was not to be. 
 The strength of the Empire began to fail after the 
 beginning of the fourth century, and its growing 
 weakness was most disastrous to the province of Africa. 
 Year by year the pressure of the Moors became more 
 severe, and the problem was no longer how to increase, 
 but how to preserve the dominions of civilization. 
 
 The danger would not have been so great, had the 
 Moors, instead of being an essentially barbarous race, 
 possessed even the rudiments of civilization. Indiffer- 
 ent, however, to heat and cold, they wore the same thick 
 cloaks the whole year round, dwelt both in winter and 
 summer in stifling huts, and — except those few who 
 were the fortunate possessors of a sheepskin rug — 
 slept upon the bare ground. They ate only the coarsest 
 kinds of food, and did not object to consuming the 
 flesh and blood of animals which had died of disease. 
 The Moors were quite ignorant of either bread or wine 
 and devoured spelt and barley uncooked. Their moral 
 degradation was equal to their physical; they had no 
 idea of the existence of a God, and they knew of the 
 civilization of the plains only to despise it. Even at 
 the end of the eighth century Cahina the Berber queen 
 ordered the destruction of all vines and olive trees, as 
 having no value in the eyes of her barbarous subjects 
 but only in those of the displaced Romans and advanc- 
 ing Saracens 1 . 
 
 1 For account of Moors see Procopius, de hello Vandal, ii. 3 ; En 
 Norveiri, transl. by Slane, pp. 332, 340. 
 
10 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 In startling contrast to this absolute barbarism was 
 the luxury and effeminacy of the lowland population 1 . 
 The richer classes and the townspeople enjoyed all the 
 conveniences, and shared in all the vicious follies of 
 perhaps the most corrupt and enervating civilization 
 that the world has ever seen. They built for them- 
 selves marvellous palaces the remains of which exist to 
 this day, and one magnificent pile has reached us in 
 sufficiently good preservation to show to what lengths 
 their luxury would go. Far from the site of any town 
 or village of the Roman period, on the road from Se"tif 
 to Constantine, stand the ruins of enormous baths. 
 They cover a plot 800 metres square and are lavishly 
 ornamented with mosaics, marbles and statues. In 
 size and magnificence they are worthy of a great city ; 
 but no city is near them, and they were erected merely 
 for the private use of the household of a great land- 
 owner, called Pompeianus 2 . 
 
 Building was one of the chief tastes of the Romans 
 in Africa, every petty municipality seeking to prove 
 its greatness by the pretentiousness of its public 
 structures. In every town was to be seen a forum 
 round which were ranged the statues of the Emperors, 
 erected as a rule by the magistrates in return for the 
 honour of their election. 
 
 Round their country seats, the rich provincials 
 planted enormous parks. Procopius 8 tells us with all 
 the authority of an eye-witness, how the army of 
 Belisarius passed the night in the "paradise" of the 
 
 1 For account of Roman civilization see Procop., de hello Vand. ii. 
 3 ; Salvian, de Gub. Dei, vii. 65 ; Boissier, L'Afrique Romaine, passim. 
 
 2 Boissier, iv. §3. 3 Procop. B. V. i. 17. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 11 
 
 king's palace at Grasse". Each soldier built a hut of 
 boughs for himself and ate without stint of the fruit 
 that grew there, yet, when the march was resumed, so 
 thick and luxuriant was the foliage that it was impos- 
 sible to tell that there had been the bivouac of more 
 than 15,000 men. Such parks as these could not have 
 been maintained in the dry soil of Africa without an 
 immense system of irrigation. To extend this system 
 was the favourite form of public benefactions. Carthage 
 was supplied by two enormous cisterns, of which one is 
 still used, while the other forms the site of a village. 
 At Thysdrus the liberality of a magistrate provided 
 water not only for the public fountains but also for 
 private houses. At Tupusuctu, where supplies were 
 stored for the Roman legions engaged in border warfare, 
 the remains of a cistern 3000 metres square still exist. 
 The Roman colonist however, if not destitute of 
 noble conceptions and a sense of public duty, was 
 enervated by luxury. He dressed no longer in the 
 toga, but wore loose robes of the most gorgeous 
 materials after the Median fashion. He could eat only 
 the most delicate food, and found life without his 
 daily bath unbearable. The richer classes occupied 
 themselves entirely in amusements. An inscription 
 lately discovered in the Forum of Thamugadi (Timgad) 
 expresses the ideal of the fashionable provincials. By 
 the side of some " tabulae lusoriae " are engraved the 
 words 1 : — 
 
 VENAEI LAVAKI 
 
 LTTDERE RIDERE 
 
 OCC EST VIVERE 
 
 1 Boissier, L'Afrique Romaine, v. § 2. 
 
12 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 — a summary which exactly tallies with the account of 
 Procopius. 
 
 In Africa, as in other parts of the Empire, chariot- 
 racing led to great popular excesses. Indeed its 
 hold on the tastes of the people was perhaps even 
 stronger than at Constantinople. Every little country- 
 town had its circus, and M. Boissier declares that 
 " coachmen then were Africans, as to-day they are 
 Englishmen 1 ." Enormous salaries were paid to success- 
 ful drivers. Crescens won in ten years 1,500,000 
 sesterces 2 . St Augustine deplored the fascination of 
 the theatre and the circus, and bewailed the fate of 
 hundreds of raw young countrymen drawn by their 
 glitter into the vortex of city-life from quiet homes. 
 
 For the fascination exercised by the towns of Africa, 
 especially Carthage, was a perpetual drain upon its re- 
 sources. The capital of the province, which ranked as 
 one of the great cities of the world, attracted settlers 
 from the most distant parts. Here was the seat of 
 the civil and military government, here dwelt the 
 Proconsul, the Magister Militum and numberless sub- 
 ordinate officials of every grade and title, and each 
 day justice, supported by the irresistible authority of 
 arbitrary power, was administered in the Forum. It 
 was moreover the intellectual and commercial centre 
 of Africa ; its schools of languages, philosophy, and the 
 liberal arts were thronged with pupils ; its magnificent 
 harbour was alive with the ships of all the civilized 
 world. Its buildings were worthy of its greatness, and 
 no heavier indictment can be brought against the 
 Vandals, than their destruction of some of its finest 
 
 1 Boissier, iv. § 3. 2 C. I. L. 12504, et seq. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 13 
 
 edifices. For in their senseless rage the invaders 
 defaced the Odeon or Concert Hall, the Theatre, the 
 Temple of Memory, and the magnificent Via Caelestis, 
 which with its decorated walls, nearly two miles in 
 length, was adorned with mosaics, and priceless 
 stones 1 . 
 
 There was however a terrible reverse to the picture. 
 The streets, if stately, were unsafe ; robbers and mur- 
 derers lurked in the side alleys to seize the unwary 
 passer by. Prostitution and still grosser vices were 
 unblushingly practised in the full light of day, and a 
 man who kept himself pure did not seem to be an 
 African 2 . 
 
 All this magnificence had to be paid for, and the 
 burthen fell on the country. As the chief export of 
 Africa was corn and her wealth was derived from it 
 alone, the harshest tyranny was used to keep up a 
 proper supply. At one time most of the land had 
 been held by a few great landowners, among whom 
 Pompeianus was probably numbered 3 , and Nero is said 
 to have executed six men, whose estates included half 
 the Province 4 . But after this the Emperors took care 
 to keep the most fertile parts of the chief granary 
 of Eome in their own hands, and we find Solomon 
 refusing to grant the lands of the Vandals to his 
 victorious army, on the express plea that they belonged 
 as a matter of right to the Imperial Treasury 6 . 
 
 1 Victor Vit. i. 3 ; Prosper, de Promissionibus, n. 38. 
 
 2 "ita enim generale in eis malum impuritatis est, ut quicumque 
 ex eis impudieus desierit, Afer non esse videatur." Salvian, de Gub. 
 Dei, vii. 65. 3 Supra p. 10. 
 
 4 Pliny, H. N. xviii. 35. 5 Prooop. de be.llo Vand. ii. 14. 
 
14 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 The system under which these estates were man- 
 aged, like all the rest of the provincial governments, 
 gave every opportunity for oppression. The people 
 were bound to the soil and at the mercy of "con- 
 ductores," who had the land at five year leases from the 
 " procuratores." Rather better off were the "coloni," 
 who held their farms direct from the Emperors in 
 consideration of a certain proportion of the produce 
 and various dues to the " conductores," as laid down 
 in the Lex Hadriana or Forma Perpetua. But besides 
 these payments in kind and money they were liable 
 to forced labour, and the " conductores " could demand 
 their unpaid services for two days in weeding time, 
 two days in harvest, and two days at some other season 
 of the year. It is evident that such a system was 
 certain to be abused. Occasionally an appeal would be 
 made directly to the Emperors 1 ; but what chance 
 had a poor colonus of getting justice from a govern- 
 ment official, backed up by all the power of vested 
 interests and class prejudices? From the time of 
 Constantine, even the coloni were bound to the soil, 
 and not until the time of Justinian was liberty 
 granted to their children by a free woman 2 . The 
 glories of Carthage and other towns rested therefore 
 upon a foundation of misery; while the city population 
 rejoiced in chariot races and splendid buildings, the 
 peasants, who ultimately paid for all, were ground 
 down to the utmost poverty and distress 3 . 
 
 But even in the most prosperous times, the state 
 
 of the agricultural population was a real source of 
 
 weakness to the Province. Their misery made them 
 
 1 G. I. L. 10570. 2 Just. Cod. xi. 47, 24. » Boissier, iv. § 4. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 15 
 
 turbulent and deprived them of all interest in the 
 maintenance of Roman rule. Oppressed by harsh land- 
 owners, robbed of their scanty gains by extortionate 
 tax-gatherers, it might well appear to them that they 
 had little concern in the quarrels of those who misused 
 them. The Donatists, who had caused not only a 
 religious schism but a social revolution, drew their chief 
 strength from the country people ; and the conquests 
 of the Vandals and Saracens would, in all probability, 
 have been far more difficult, if the peasantry had been 
 more attached to the Imperial regime. 
 
 This disaffection was a serious danger long before 
 it was openly manifested, and then it became positively 
 fatal. The hold of Rome upon Africa depended entirely 
 upon her power of reconciling the Moors to her rule 
 and of enrolling them among her civilized subjects. 
 Her power, nay her very existence depended upon a 
 successful solution of this difficult problem. Now the 
 connecting link between the cultured inhabitants of 
 the towns and the barbarian Moors of the mountains 
 were the despised class of oppressed coloni. Living 
 as they did right up to the boundaries of the Province, 
 they inevitably mixed with the old possessors of the 
 land, and the hybrid race of Liby-Phoenicians, thus 
 produced, formed an invaluable bridge between civili- 
 zation and barbarism. 
 
 Such a solution of racial problems was no new 
 thing to Roman statesmen. In every province the 
 policy of the imperial city was to train up the in- 
 digenous inhabitants until they were fit to become 
 citizens of herself, and to effect this purpose was far less 
 difficult in Africa than elsewhere. Here there was 
 
16 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 no national resistance on the part of the numerous 
 petty tribes, who, indignant as they were at their 
 own fate, felt a certain satisfaction in seeing their 
 domestic enemies in a plight similar to their own. 
 Neither was any rivalry of diverse creeds to be feared. 
 A marked feature of the Berber temperament is the 
 essentially local character of its religion, whether 
 nominally pagan, Christian, or Mahommedan. When 
 the Moors were pagans, each village had its tutelary 
 deity ; when they were Christians, each township had 
 its own Bishop and its particular martyrs; when they 
 were Mahommedans, the local saint or marabout was 
 as much revered as the Prophet himself. Rome on 
 the other hand had by the end of the Republic few 
 religious scruples. Her faith was an accommodating 
 polytheism, which was as ready to recognise Saturnus 
 Augustus in Baal-Hamman as it had been to identify 
 Minerva with Athene 1 . In a comparatively short time 
 a real connection might have been established between 
 the Moors and the people of the country districts, 
 which would have grown steadily stronger until the 
 civilization of Rome had been firmly established in 
 the Province of Africa. 
 
 For the natural tendency of two neighbouring races 
 to amalgamate was assisted by the political necessities 
 of the Empire. If the corn-supply of Rome had 
 failed, the authority of the Emperors would have been 
 severely shaken, and it was therefore their direct 
 interest to maintain the agricultural population of 
 Africa. In nearly all the provinces it had become a 
 settled policy to introduce bodies of barbarians from 
 1 Boissier, vii. § 2. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 17 
 
 beyond the borders 1 and to settle them on the land as 
 " coloni"; in all probability the same plan was adopted 
 in Africa and by its agency a sufficient number of 
 peasants were provided to cultivate the enormous 
 Imperial estates. At any rate the defence of the 
 frontiers was entrusted to a Berber militia, who were con- 
 trived to play a double part. The " limitanei," as they 
 were called, were expected to beat off the raids of 
 the unsubdued tribes, and, as their pay consisted in 
 grants of land on the borders, they at the same time 
 acted as the outposts of civilization. 
 
 In other ways, too, the military forces of the 
 province helped to unite the Berbers and Liby- 
 Phoenicians. Not only were the " limitanei " and the 
 " foederati " entirely Moorish by race, but the perma- 
 nent garrison of regulars, the Legio Tertia Augusta, 
 had become largely so. For centuries it had been 
 stationed at Lambaesa and there its ranks were re- 
 cruited, its soldiers lived and its veterans died. To 
 serve in the ranks while able-bodied, to marry a woman 
 of the neighbourhood, to retire to a farm as near the 
 old head-quarters as possible was the ordinary fate 
 of the Roman legionary. His place was taken by his 
 son born of a Moorish mother, or by a recruit from 
 the uncivilized tribes of the hills. Every year saw 
 more and more recruits of mixed blood entering the 
 ranks until at length the legion became Roman rather 
 in name than in fact 2 - Whether this was satisfactory 
 
 1 Fustel de Coulanges, Becherches sur quelques probtemes d'histoire, 
 p. 32. 
 
 2 Boissier, L'Afrique Romaine, iii. 4 ; Cagnat, L'Armee Romaine, 
 iv. 2. 
 
 H. 2 
 
18 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 from a military point of view or not, the continuous 
 stream of veterans, Moors by race but Romans by 
 training, was of the highest value as a means of 
 effecting a union between the diverse nations inhabit- 
 ing Africa. 
 
 By these three means then, the inevitable mingling 
 of the Phoenician settlers and the African aborigines, 
 the actual planting of African "coloni" and the gradual 
 Libyanizing of the Roman forces, the country popula- 
 tion formed a connecting link between the over-civilized 
 Carthaginian and the barbarous mountaineer. Un- 
 fortunately for Africa this link never grew strong 
 enough to bear a strain, and the Moors beyond the 
 borders remained a standing menace to civilization. 
 
 With such a heterogeneous population it is not 
 surprising to find that there were three languages in 
 common use in Africa, Latin, Punic and Libyan 1 . Greek 
 had never gained much foothold ; it had only lingered 
 as the speech of polite society, and by the time of 
 Augustus the great mass of the people had forgotten 
 its very letters. Libyan on the other hand was the 
 tongue of the country people and of the Moors of the 
 highlands. It was never a literary language and none 
 of the African historians have written in it ; for 
 Hiempsal used Punic, Juba Greek, and Ibn Khaldoun 
 Arabic. Nevertheless it existed and still exists; St 
 Augustine mentions it, there are some inscriptions 
 near Cirta in it and it is now taught in the French 
 Government schools of Kabylia. It was in fact the 
 vernacular of the less civilized parts of the Province. 
 
 In the more civilized parts Punic took its place. 
 1 Boissier, vii. § 5. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 19 
 
 St Augustine says of the people near Hippo, " interro- 
 gati rustici nostri quid shit, Punice respondentes 
 ' Chenani,' corrupta scilicet voce, sicut in talibus 
 solet, quid aliud respondent, quam ' Chenanaei 1 ' ; " 
 and in establishing a fresh See at Fussala, he makes 
 it of the first importance that the new Bishop must 
 speak Punic 2 . The " Circumcelliones " too could only 
 speak to the Donatist priests "per Punicum inter- 
 pretem." Still it was a failing language, for when 
 St Augustine quotes a Punic proverb in one of his 
 sermons, he adds the Latin translation with the 
 words : — 
 
 " Latine vobis dicam, quia Punice non omnes nostis." 
 Of course Latin was not the natural language of 
 Africa, and it probably never became universal. How far 
 it may have won its way after the Vandal domination 
 cannot be accurately determined, but the Byzantines 
 said that the African provincials spoke it more fluently 
 than the Romans themselves. Mr Hodgkin thinks that 
 it was probably used with " an affected prettiness, and 
 want of spontaneity and naturalness 3 ." For it gained 
 ground entirely through the learned classes. The 
 Romans never insisted upon Latin as the official lan- 
 guage of their provinces, and left so much of the local 
 government to the hands of the old magistrates, that 
 to force them to carry on public affairs in a foreign 
 tongue would have produced chaos. No doubt the 
 Church helped to spread it widely, and it is to Latin 
 versions of the Scriptures written in Africa that we 
 
 i Tissot, I. i. 2. 2 Aug. Ep. 209. 3. 
 
 a Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders, Vol. n. 240. 
 
 2—2 
 
20 THE CHRISTIAN. CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 owe the basis of the modem Vulgate 1 - Yet the 
 number of epitaphs which are to be found in Africa, 
 which pay no attention to either scansion or metre, 
 and St Augustine's remark 
 
 ' Afrae aures de correptione vocalium vel produc- 
 tione non judicant 2 ' 
 
 prove that up to a fairly late period, it was still a 
 foreign language to the provincials. Yet, though it was 
 almost universally known by all who pretended to any 
 degree of culture or learning, St Augustine tells us 
 that he picked it up by listening to others talking it 3 , 
 and Victor Vitensis is moved to the deepest indigna- 
 tion at the declaration of the Arian Cyrila, who an- 
 nounced at the Conference of Carthage 484, that he 
 could not understand Latin *. 
 
 Such then was the material on which the Church 
 had to work. A province divided against itself by 
 race, by language, by civilization, by wealth. In the 
 cities a people, cultured and corrupt, rich and pleasure- 
 loving, with the vices of the East and the power of 
 the West. On the borders a nation of uncultivated 
 barbarians, careless of even their own comfort, desirous 
 only of plunder, ignorant of the very existence of a 
 God. Between these two extremes lay the cultivators 
 of the soil ; a mixed race, mainly composed of Phoe- 
 nicians and Libyans, oppressed and ground down, they 
 helped, though without success, to bridge over the great 
 gulf between the cultured Eoman, and the barbarian 
 Moor. Their own miserable condition prevented them 
 
 1 Boissier, vi. 5. 2 de doctr. Christ, iv. 24. 8 Conf. i. 14, 23. 
 4 Victor Vitensia, ii. 18. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 21 
 
 from really uniting the two races ; they stood too far 
 apart from each and had too few common interests 
 with either. As they failed to join conquerors and 
 conquered together, some other body had to keep them 
 apart; this other body was the army. The Roman 
 domination seemed secure ; but it rested on a most 
 unstable basis. Only the ceaseless vigilance of the 
 military commanders and the untiring energy of the 
 legionaries kept the fair plains of the lowlands and 
 the rich streets of Carthage from the ruthless raids 
 of the Moors. As the fertility of the province depended 
 upon a gigantic system of irrigation, so its prosperity 
 relied on the efficient organization of its garrison ; and 
 as in the fight with nature man in the long run must 
 be beaten, so when civilization is as selfish as it was in 
 Africa, barbarism is sure to conquer. 
 
 On the outside the Roman Province seemed pros- 
 perous, but its prosperity was only skin-deep. The 
 poor colonus toiled, but he did not reap ; and the rich 
 Carthaginian and the idle Roman grew fat upon his 
 misery. The tiller of the soil cared little for a civiliza- 
 tion he did not enjoy, and had no interest in trying to 
 save it from the hands of the invader. 
 
 Meanwhile, ever watchful and ever ready to seize 
 their opportunity, in their inaccessible mountains and 
 pathless desert, stood the threatening Moors. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 The African Church to 398 a.d. 
 
 Although the African Church played so important 
 a part in the history of Christianity, no definite in- 
 formation has reached us as to the date at which the 
 Gospel first was preached in the Province or by whose 
 hand the earliest seeds were sown. Tertullian, the first 
 great figure in the annals of this Church, appears sud- 
 denly on the scene. Before him we know of no African 
 Christians, and it is from his writings alone that we 
 gather how numerous and influential they had already 
 become. No mention however is made of the first 
 preaching of the gospel in Africa, nor is any Apostle 
 claimed as the founder of the local church. 
 
 Probably the Church of Carthage was an offshoot of 
 the Church of Rome and came into existence without 
 any deliberate missionary effort 1 . Between the capital 
 of the Empire and the capital of the Province, there 
 was continual communication. On Africa, Rome 
 depended for her corn-supply; to Rome, Africa owed 
 her government, her defence and her culture. The 
 
 1 Munter, Primordia Ecelesiae Africanae, Chap. iv. 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 23 
 
 trade between Carthage and the Imperial City was 
 constant and regular, and it would have been surprising 
 if the growing Church of Rome had not seized the 
 opportunity of extending the Gospel to Africa. It is 
 easy to imagine that the first Christians in the Province 
 were led to go there in pursuit of their ordinary com- 
 mercial avocations ; or we may suppose that Nero and 
 Trajan by their persecutions drove some believers to 
 flee to Africa and thus, as was not uncommon, these 
 emperors helped to spread the very Faith they were 
 trying to crush. Gregory I. indeed in one of his letters 1 
 asserts that the Apostolic Succession in Africa was 
 derived from the Roman Church, and the great Pope's 
 statement, if not conclusive, is at least probable. 
 
 The date of the foundation of the African Church is 
 as obscure as its origin. It is however generally put 
 down as the end of the first or the beginning of the 
 second century. Gibbon 2 says that it is impossible to 
 find in the province " any assured traces either of faith 
 or persecution that ascend higher than the reign of the 
 Antonines." 
 
 When once it was established the Church of Carth- 
 age took a prominent place amongst the communions 
 of the West. In character it resembled the Church at 
 Rome and its relations with the Apostolic See were 
 always close. In speaking of the Decian persecution, 
 Dean Milman emphasizes the connection thus 3 : — 
 
 " Rome, the recognised metropolis of the West, and 
 
 1 Ep. viii. 33. Ad Dominicum. 2 Chap. xv. 
 
 3 Latin Christianity, i. 59, also Munter, Primordia Ecclesiae 
 Afrieanae, oh. xiv. 
 
24 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Carthage, the metropolis of the African Churches, now 
 are in constant and regular intercourse. There is first 
 a Punic league, afterwards at least a threatened Punic 
 war. In the persecution, the churches are brought into 
 close alliance by common sympathies, common perils, 
 common sufferings, singularly enough by common 
 schisms ; slowly, but no doubt at length, by their com- 
 mon language." 
 
 At first sight it seems probable that the Church of 
 Africa would have close relations with the Church of 
 Egypt. But if the circumstances of the time are con- 
 sidered, the deceptiveness of the geographical proximity 
 of the two communions at once appears. Carthage and 
 Alexandria are, it is true, on the same continent, but 
 there were many obstacles, both physical and political, 
 to keep them apart. 
 
 In the first place Egypt and Africa are very effectu- 
 ally divided by the deserts of Cyrenaica. The settle- 
 ments along the shores of the Syrtis, whether Roman, 
 Greek or Phoenician, were a mere fringe along the coast 
 and never reached far inland. Nearly all their com- 
 munications with the rest of the world were carried 
 on by sea, and such land routes as existed were tra- 
 versed only by caravans, which were quite insufficient 
 in number to maintain the constant intercourse neces- 
 sary to keep up a close connection between two great 
 societies. So difficult indeed was this overland travel- 
 ling that even when the Saracens had taken Egypt, 
 Africa with its desert frontier was thought secure from 
 every attack 1 . On the other hand the voyage from 
 
 1 Moreelli, Africa Christiana, sub ann. 635. 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 25 
 
 Carthage to Alexandria was not an easy one. The 
 perils of the sandy Syrtis have been sung by every 
 Latin poet, and the ancients in their open ships did 
 not care to trust themselves amongst the treacherous 
 shoals and sudden squalls of the Bay of Tripoli. 
 
 The rivalry moreover between the Egyptian and 
 African provinces was a bar to their inter-communica- 
 tion. Both exported corn ; both imported luxuries. 
 In the natural course of trade the number of vessels 
 plying between the two countries must have been much 
 less than the number of those which carried the pro- 
 duce of Carthage to Rome, and of Alexandria to 
 Constantinople. Moreover the distance of Africa from 
 the Imperial City was only a third of that of Carthage 
 from its great rival. 
 
 If the geographical isolation and commercial 
 jealousy did not conduce to much intercourse between 
 the two provinces, the characters of their populations 
 did nothing to bring them nearer. They were essen- 
 tially unlike one another. When Egypt was not 
 Egyptian, it was Greek ; when Africa was not Punic, it 
 was Roman. The civilization of Alexandria was Greek, 
 and Greek was the common language ; the civilization 
 of Carthage was Latin, and Latin became more and 
 more the tongue of the educated. As the Alexandrian 
 prided himself on being more Hellenic than the 
 Athenian, so in later times the Roman Phoenicians 
 of North Africa held that in them alone was continued 
 the true stock of Rome 1 . Hence whilst Alexandria has 
 given us the Septuagint, it is to Africa that the Church 
 
 1 Finlay, Greece under the Romans, p. 386. 
 
26 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 owed the first Latin Version of the Old and New 
 Testaments. 
 
 Even in their theological disputes the two Churches 
 differed ; the class of problems which troubled the 
 clergy of Carthage was not the same as the questions 
 which agitated the Alexandrians. The Eastern mind 
 of the Copt was concerned about the mysteries of the 
 Trinity, and of the nature of Christ ; the African was 
 more interested in the troubles which beset the Christ- 
 ian in his earthly warfare. Could a man live a perfect 
 life without Divine help ? Did those baptized by 
 heretics stand in need of further baptism ? Was 
 virginity a higher state than that of an honourable 
 marriage ? Such were the questions which the less 
 mystical intellect of the Western Christians felt to be 
 all important. When, as in the days of the Monothelites, 
 an attempt was made to interest the Church of Africa 
 in the questions that rent asunder Eastern Christendom, 
 the missionaries found that their words fell on unheed- 
 ing, if not unintelligent ears. 
 
 On the whole, then, it seems most unlikely that the 
 relations of the Churches of Carthage and Alexandria 
 were at all close. There was nothing to bring them 
 together; the distance between them was long and 
 difficult and their theological interests were completely 
 different. In fact so little communication between 
 them was there in later times that their independence 
 had produced ignorance and this ignorance absolute 
 schism. During the Vandal rule Fulgentius had to 
 seek in every direction, in order to arrive at information 
 about Egypt, and was then warned that the monks of 
 the Thebaid were no longer in communion with the 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 27 
 
 Roman Church, and that they would refuse to admit 
 him to partake of the sacred mysteries with them 1 . 
 Even if this statement went too far and exaggerated 
 the feelings of the bulk of the Coptic Church, there can 
 be no doubt that it would have never been made if 
 Alexandria, and not Rome, had been the principal ex- 
 ternal influence upon Carthage. 
 
 I have said that in all probability Christianity 
 obtained its foothold in Africa at the end of the first or 
 the beginning of the second century, but it is with 
 Tertullian that we first get any certain records of the 
 state of the Church. Evidently in the first century of 
 its existence it had at least numerically made very 
 rapid strides. Gibbon 2 contrasts the " slow progress of 
 the Gospel in the cold climate of Gaul" with the "eager- 
 ness with which it seems to have been received on the 
 burning sands of Africa" : Tertullian 3 himself taunts the 
 pagans with the dilemma in which they would find 
 themselves, were they successful in driving out all the 
 Christians. But this rapid increase was by no means 
 an unmixed good. Not only did their strength attract 
 more persecution than fell to the share of any other 
 branch of the Chui-ch, but it meant a rapid falling off 
 in the standard of average Christian morality. 
 
 As long as the Church had been a small despised 
 body, no one would enter it except from sheer convic- 
 tion ; but once it became fashionable to be a Christian 
 and the new believers claimed the right of submitting 
 themselves to those dictates of fashion which were 
 scarcely reconcilable with the teaching of the Church. 
 
 1 Vita Sti Fulgentii, § 12. 2 Gibbon, ch. xv. 
 
 3 Apologia, oh. xxxvu. 
 
28 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Partly through the circumstances of her origin, partly- 
 through the state of the society of the day, the Christian 
 Church had always set her face against the luxurious 
 practices of the richer classes. Stern simplicity in food, 
 dress, and mode of life had been the invariable rule for 
 the early Christians, and the bishops looked with dread 
 upon any symptoms of nascent extravagance among 
 their flocks. But now that the Faith had spread to 
 every class it was impossible to prevent the more 
 wealthy converts from surrounding themselves with 
 those comforts to which they had been accustomed. 
 In comparatively early days Tertulliau and Cyprian 
 had thundered in vain against the growing laxity of 
 the Christians. The former in his " De Cultu Femi- 
 narum," the latter in his "De Habitu Virginum" 
 censured especially the ladies of fashion for the cost- 
 liness and luxury of their costumes ; such admonitions 
 as these however had little chance of permanent success, 
 and the attempt on the part of the Church to enforce 
 severe sumptuary laws on all members was on the 
 whole injurious to authority. Those, who had defied 
 ecclesiastical order in the matter of comparative non- 
 essentials, soon presumed to do so in the weightier 
 matters of morality. 
 
 For it was impossible to preserve the simple living 
 of the early Christians and impolitic to lay too much 
 stress upon it, when there were other demands which 
 might fairly be made upon the converts. The regular 
 routine of everyday life amongst the Komans involved 
 many objectionable customs. A perfunctory respect to 
 the heathen gods was exacted by the rules of polite 
 society, or some ceremony had to be performed, which, 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 29 
 
 common-place as it seemed to the ordinary Carthaginian, 
 was to the sensitive purity of the Christian licentious 
 and immodest in the extreme. The convert, who did 
 not give up entirely his old life and associates, was 
 continually forced to choose between an awkward, and 
 perhaps dangerous, assertion of his Faith, or an un- 
 worthy compliance with heathen practices. Christian 
 soldiers in particular^ found themselves in a dilemma ; 
 much of their daily routine and even their oath of 
 allegiance itself forced them to recognize the old gods 
 of the Empire, so that it seemed impossible for them to 
 reconcile their military with their religious duties 1 . 
 Without doubt many converts manfully faced the diffi- 
 culty and preferred to abandon their old friends and 
 society rather than seem faithless to their Lord. 
 But others did not, and, as Christianity became more 
 general, the number of these warriors largely increased, 
 and profoundly affected the religious life of the 
 Province. 
 
 Not only did the morality of the Christians suffer, 
 and Carthage continue to be even under nominally 
 Christian influence one of the most luxurious and 
 licentious cities in the world, but the actual spread 
 of the true faith and the extinction of the old customs 
 was greatly delayed. It was natural for men, who had 
 neglected the teachings of the Church in small things 
 to grow slack about greater things, and as their habits 
 of compliance gained strength they looked with in- 
 difference upon the remnants of paganism. The synods 
 held at Carthage on June and September 401 had to 
 petition the Emperors that the still surviving heathen 
 1 Tertullian, de Corona. 
 
30 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 temples should be destroyed, and absolutely prohibited 
 the holding of any more banquets hi connection with 
 them 1 . Even in the days of St Augustine the worship 
 of the old gods had not died out, and his writings 
 contain many allusions to his success in dealing with 
 its suppression 2 . The country districts were the chief 
 strongholds of heathenism, and various customs lin- 
 gered in them, as they still do in the more primitive 
 parts of England. Even Carthage was not entirely free 
 from paganism. The worship of Caelestis, one of the 
 national deities, survived, and some of the most 
 powerful and most notable citizens were amongst its 
 votaries; even the Christians did not repudiate it as 
 they should have done, and some, trying to unite the 
 service of Christ and the devil, approached the altar 
 of God with garments still scented with incense offered 
 to Caelestis 8 . 
 
 In fact at the beginning of the fifth century, the 
 Christianity of the mass of the Carthaginians was only 
 nominal. The stricter lives of the clergy, who had 
 withdrawn themselves from the lives and pursuits of 
 the laity provoked ridicule rather than admiration. 
 The pallid faces, long robes and close-cropped hair of 
 the monks and hermits moved the people to derision, 
 and the clergy as they walked through the public places 
 were greeted with a storm of abuse, curses, laughter 
 and derisive whistles. It was even possible for Salvian 
 to assert that the Apostles had been safer amongst the 
 
 1 Hefele, Councils of Church, Vol. n. pp. 421 3, 426. 
 
 2 Darraa, Histoire Generate de VEglise, Vol. xi. p. 21 ; Vol. xn. 
 p. 145. 
 
 3 Salvian, de Gubern. Dei, viii. 2, 3. 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 31 
 
 heathen than were the priests in professedly Christian 
 Africa 1 . In his wrath at the infidelity of the Cartha- 
 ginians Salvian compares them with other nations. 
 Most heathen and savage peoples, he says, have some 
 especial vice, but with Africans all vices are carried 
 to perfection. If the Goths are treacherous, they are 
 chaste ; if the Alans are unchaste, they are not 
 treacherous. The Franks are liars, but at least they 
 are hospitable, and the cruel Saxons are remarkable 
 for their continence. Most nations have their peculiar 
 virtues as well as their peculiar faults, but over nearly 
 all the Africans every vice holds sway. If anyone is 
 accused of inhumanity, they are inhuman ; of drunken- 
 ness, they are drunken ; of deceit, they are most 
 deceitful ; of treachery, they are most treacherous. To 
 all these vices they add unchastity and blasphemy 
 and attain a terrible preeminence in wickedness 2 . 
 
 To win such men as these to righteousness was no 
 easy task, and it was unfortunate that the ideal adopted 
 by the Church tended to separate the clergy from the 
 people. It is easy to criticize nowadays the policy of 
 the Councils and to point out the certain effects of 
 the withdrawal of Christian influences from the every- 
 day life of the Carthaginians ; but it was not so easy a 
 matter for the men of the fifth century to know how to 
 combine their duty as Christians with the observances 
 of a society so deeply tainted with licentiousness. 
 We may regret but we cannot now condemn the de- 
 cisions of the Councils, which bade the African clergy 
 cut themselves off from their neighbours and renounce 
 for ever the luxurious city life of the time. If they 
 1 Salvian, de Gub. Dei, vni. 4, 5. 2 Ibid. va. 15. 
 
32 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 had boldly faced the difficulty and tried to mix with 
 the ordinary townspeople, while preserving their Chris- 
 tian purity, they would no doubt have met with many 
 trials and continual annoyances, but their influence 
 might possibly have been much increased and their 
 example would have aided not only the cause of re- 
 ligion but the actual prosperity of the state. How- 
 ever it seemed best to the African episcopate for the 
 clergy to separate themselves from the rest of their 
 fellow-citizens and to follow a distinct rule of life, 
 although many Christians managed to hold important 
 and honourable positions in the state without falling 
 away from their religious duty. 
 
 The theatre and all connected with it was in Africa 
 and elsewhere especially marked out for the Church's 
 censure. No cleric and no member of his family might 
 witness a secular play ; no performance was to take 
 place on Sundays or feast-days, and no actor, who had 
 given up his profession on his conversion, was to be 
 forced to return to his old calling 1 The dress of the 
 clergy was to be plain and unassuming, and they were 
 not to waste their time by trimming their hair or 
 beards 2 . They were not to go to inns unless they were 
 travelling 3 ; they were not to be seen in the forum 
 except on business 4 , and they were not to under- 
 take a journey unless their duty called them, and even 
 then only by permission of the diocesan. The bishops 
 
 1 Council of Hippo, 393, § 11 ; Council of Carthage, 398, § 8 ; 
 401, §§ 5—7. 
 
 2 Council of Carthage, 398, §§ 44—5. 
 8 Council of Hippo, 393, § 26. 
 
 4 Council of Carthage, 398, §§ 47—8. 
 
THE AFRICAN CHUECH TO 398 A.D. 33 
 
 whilst legislating for the clergy did not fail to subject 
 themselves to severe restrictions, and if they crossed 
 the seas the primate of their province must consent 
 and must issue formal 'litterae formatae' to them 1 . 
 At home they were to live quiet lives, supporting 
 themselves by their own exertions, but not entering 
 upon any trade for the sake of growing rich 2 . To take 
 interest for their money or to act as the business agents 
 of others was especially forbidden them, and they were 
 not to devote the energy, consecrated to higher objects, 
 to mere secular employments 3 . 
 
 Like all other branches of the early Church the 
 Africans set a very high value upon celibacy. Second 
 marriages were regarded with disfavour, and widows 
 were encouraged to devote themselves to chastity. To 
 the unmarried the glories of a virgin life were continu- 
 ally dwelt upon. The question of the marriage of the 
 clergy was a more difficult one. At first all ranks seem 
 to have been allowed to marry, but gradually the 
 Church changed its policy. In the Popedom of either 
 Siricius or of Zosimus, a synod held at Telepte ordered 
 that no ecclesiastic should marry a widow, and that a 
 layman who had done so could never be admitted to 
 even the lowest orders ; moreover if " priests or Levites " 
 had wives, they were to love them as sisters and live 
 with them as such. This last canon was evidently almost 
 impossible to carry out, though the Codex Canonum 
 went so far as to decree the deposition of bishops, priests 
 
 1 Council of Hippo, 393, § 27 ; Council of Carthage, 405 ; 407, § 12. 
 
 2 Council of Carthage, 398, §§ 51—3. 
 
 3 Councils of Carthage, 345, §§ 8, 9, 13, 6, and Hippo, 393, §§ 15, 
 22 ; Archbp Benson, Cyprian. His life. His times. His work. 
 
 H. 3 
 
34 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 and deacons who had transgressed it 1 . On the other hand, 
 the force of human nature was recognised, and as it was 
 acknowledged that some men were weak, the Council of 
 Hippo of 393 directed the "lectores," as soon as they 
 reached the age of puberty, to choose definitely between 
 immediate marriage and lifelong celibacy 2 
 
 There was indeed much need of stringent regulation 
 upon this point. Carthage, it has already been said, 
 was particularly prone to the vice of incontinence. 
 Unfortunate incidents had even happened in the Church 
 itself, and the overzealous character of the Africans led 
 them to expose themselves to dangers, from which 
 prudence would have made them flee 3 . The consecrated 
 virgins did not always live together, and sometimes 
 shared the same house with young ecclesiastics, thus 
 laying themselves open to scandalous, if unfounded, 
 charges. Several councils had their attention called to 
 this matter and canons were passed ordering all women, 
 who had solemnly renounced marriage, and whose parents 
 were dead, to live with respectable women, appointed 
 by the bishop or priests 4 . The unmarried clergy of 
 the inferior orders were not to visit them except by 
 their diocesan's permission, and then not alone ; while 
 even bishops and priests if they went to see them were 
 to be accompanied by other ecclesiastics or by persons 
 of repute 6 . 
 
 Even in common honesty the African clergy some- 
 times fell short of the standard of Christian morality. 
 
 1 Councils of Telepte, § 9 ; Carthage, 357—90, § 3 ; 401, § 4 ; Codex 
 Canon. § 25. 
 
 2 Council of Hippo, 393, § 18. » Gibbon, ch. xv. 
 4 Council of Hippo, 393, § 31. 5 Ibid. §§ 16, 24. 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 35 
 
 Cyprian complained that some of his brethren were 
 guilty of fraud and peculation, and of cheating the 
 widows, who had entrusted them with their property, 
 and that others were so ignorant that they could not 
 teach the catechumens or distinguish heresy from 
 orthodox doctrines 1 . Later on trouble arose through 
 the jealousy of the clergy and the encroachments of 
 bishops upon the diocese of their neighbours ; canons 
 had to be decreed forbidding any prelate to be the 
 " intercessor " of a vacant see for more than one year, 
 and Bishop Cresconius of Villa Eegia was threatened 
 with the civil power for holding unlawfully the see of 
 Tubuna 2 . Moreover both bishops and priests were 
 inclined to treat the property of the Church as their own 
 and to dispose of it as they pleased. The Councils of 
 Carthage in 398 3 , in September 401 4 , in 421 6 , prohibited 
 any sale of such goods without the consent of the 
 diocesan and his clergy. The Church went so far as to 
 declare that if an ecclesiastic without property at his 
 ordination was afterwards found to be rich, the burden 
 of the proof that his wealth was honestly gained rested 
 with him. If he could shew that his money was fairly 
 his, he might use it as he liked, provided he publicly 
 declared how he intended to employ it. 
 
 Evidently some of the clergy were totally unfit for 
 their high office, and in two cases criminal bishops were 
 deposed by the provincial councils. Bishop Equitius of 
 
 1 Diet. Christian Biography, art. ' Cyprian.' 
 
 2 Councils of Carthage, 345, § 10 ; 387, § 11 ; Hippo, 393, § 2 ; 
 Carthage, 397, § 1 ; 401, §§ 9, 11. 
 
 3 Canons, 31, 2. 4 Canon, 5. 
 6 Canon, 4 ; 9—10 ; Codex Canonum, §§ 32—3. 
 
 3—2 
 
36 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Hippo Diarrhytus was warned by the two Councils of 
 Carthage, held in 401, and was deprived by the Council 
 of 404 '. Anton, Bishop of Fussala, was guilty of the 
 grossest fraud and extortion, and was punished in the 
 same way by the Numidian synod of 423 2 . Even at the 
 beginning of the fourth century the conduct of the 
 Donatists and of Purpurius bishop of Limata proves the 
 utter lack of Christian virtue in the less civilised parts of 
 Africa, for the prelate feared not to boast in a provincial 
 synod that he had slain his sister's son and threatened 
 to treat in the same way all who opposed him 3 . 
 
 In spite of all these failures the African Church in 
 the early part of the 5th century progressed, as indeed 
 it could hardly fail to do under the guidance of the 
 combined genius and piety of St Augustine and of those 
 who came under his powerful influence. Some of its 
 clergy and even of its bishops might be unworthy ; the 
 town population might scoff at its simplicity and purity ; 
 the country people might cling to their idols ; but for 
 all that the cause of Christ was steadily winning its way 
 in the province until it met its first great trial in the 
 Vandal persecution. The organization of the Church 
 and its bold resistance to the evils of the day prove its 
 vitality. In the thirty years before the coming of 
 Gaiseric, the African Christians were able almost to 
 annihilate Donatism, to cripple Manichaeism, and to 
 cast out the Pelagians. They could appeal with con- 
 fidence to the secular authorities for aid, and many of 
 the highest officials in the time of the Vandals were 
 prepared to risk their all for their Faith. Evidently 
 
 1 Hefele, Vol. n. p. 440. 2 Ibid _ p _ 480i 
 
 3 Optatus, de Schism. Donat. in. 8. 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 37 
 
 then the Church, in spite of many difficulties and much 
 discouragement, had steadily gained ground amongst 
 the very classes with whom the luxury of the Roman 
 world is chiefly associated. Even the crimes, against 
 which the canons were directed, bespeak the success of 
 Christianity, and many of the failings of the clergy are 
 such as are almost inevitably engendered by prosperity. 
 If the system of celibacy caused abuses, its existence 
 proves the Church's influence. If some of the priests 
 and bishops were guilty of fraud, the riches to be 
 embezzled must have been great to make men risk 
 their temporal and spiritual positions for the sake of a 
 doubtful gain. Moreover, whenever crimes were com- 
 mitted, they received a prompt reproof from the 
 ecclesiastical synods, which met frequently to correct 
 abuses. 
 
 The synodical organization of the African Church 
 was brought to a high state of efficiency by its fourfold 
 character : the diocese, the province, the episcopate, and 
 the entire country having each its peculiar assembly. 
 The clergy consulted with their bishop in the " con- 
 ventus" or "compresbyterium." The provincial bishops 
 met every year in Lent and Autumn. Except Tripoli, 
 whose poverty forbade it to send more than one, every 
 province elected two representative bishops to serve on 
 a committee to be summoned for special business, 
 while a general council of the whole of Africa was 
 assembled at Carthage on August 23 in every year, at 
 which all the prelates were expected to be present 1 . 
 However, it was found that this annual gathering 
 
 1 Council of Hippo, 393, Can. 5 ; Council of Carthage, 418, Can. 19. 
 2nd Council of Carthage, 401, Canon 8. 
 
38 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 imposed too great a burden on the episcopate, and it 
 was ordained that it was only to meet when there was 
 real need for it, and that all provincial matters were to 
 be settled as far as possible by the provincial synods 1 . 
 
 In other matters the organization of the African 
 Church was not so happy. The diocesan system was 
 profoundly affected by a trait in the national character, 
 which still finds its counterpart among the Berbers 
 of Morocco and Tunis. When the province was first 
 converted and as long as the persecutions lasted this 
 local hero-worship exalted the martyrs and confessors 
 to an unreasonable importance. In the time of 
 Tertullian the reconciliation of excommunicated per- 
 sons through the intercession of confessors had 
 become a regular custom, and had already been 
 abused by the wholesale pardoning of the worst 
 criminals 2 . In the time of Cyprian the sufferers in 
 the Decian persecution claimed even more power than 
 the clergy. The lapsed, whether " libellatici " or 
 " thurificati," asked their aid for readmission to the 
 Church they had betrayed; while some of the confessors 
 became so puffed up by adulation that they issued 
 pardons to include not only the man mentioned 
 but all his unnamed friends 3 . Finally, the bishops 
 were solemnly ordered in the name of all the confessors 
 to reinstate at once all the lapsed. Later on we find 
 that as in the third century this excessive reverence 
 caused the schism of Felicissimus and Novatius, so at the 
 
 1 Council of Carthage, 409, Canon 1. For the whole question of 
 African Synods see Dissertation by Garner in Migne's Patrologia. 
 
 2 Tertull. ad Martyres, § 1 ; de Pudicitia, § 22. 
 
 3 Cypr. Ep. xx. "Communicet ille cum suis." 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 39 
 
 beginning of the fourth no small part of the bitterness of 
 the Donatist party was excited by the well-meant effort 
 of Mensurius and Caecilian to check the exaggerated 
 importance given to the imprisoned confessors. The 
 sixth Carthaginian synod, held on the 13th of Septem- 
 ber, 401, had to protest against the multiplication of 
 chapels to martyrs and decree that they should not be 
 built except to contain relics or at anyplace intimately 
 associated with the life of the saint 1 . The fantastic 
 suicides of the Circumcelliones, and the caution exercised 
 by the Vandal persecutors to check this tendency prove 
 how truly characteristic and how fully recognised it was 
 in the religious life of Africa 2 . 
 
 But this intense hero-worship had still more impor- 
 tant consequences than the adulation of martyrs. It 
 profoundly affected the whole organization of the 
 African Church. It led to the foundation of innumer- 
 able small dioceses, each of which had sufficient 
 patriotism to resist strenuously any interference with 
 their own autonomy, however well-meant or necessary. 
 Already in the days of St Cyprian it was possible to 
 collect together nearly 90 bishops in council, but in 
 later times the sees seem to have multiplied enor- 
 mously. In 411, at the great Council of Carthage 
 against the Donatists, 565 bishops were present, 286 
 being Catholics and 279 Donatists. Again, in a.d. 483 
 when Hunneric summoned all the Catholic episcopate 
 to plead their case against the Arians, 466 bishops 
 appeared at Carthage 3 . It seems to have been the habit 
 
 1 Canon 17. 2 Victor Titensis, i. 14, et passim. 
 
 3 See Notitia appended to Victor Vitensia in the Corpus Scriptorum 
 Eccl. 
 
40 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 to consecrate a bishop to any place which contained a 
 congregation of even moderate proportions, and in 387 
 the council held at Carthage attempted to check this 
 tendency by ordering that no new sees should be 
 created 1 . It was impossible to stop the practice, and 
 twenty years later another council of Carthage passed 
 a canon declaring that, before an additional diocese 
 could be set up, the consent of the Primate, of the 
 Provincial Synod and of the bishop on whose jurisdic- 
 tion the new see would encroach, must be obtained 2 . 
 On the other hand, to forbid all multiplication of 
 dioceses would have meant great hindrance to the work 
 of the Church; for the need of more bishops increased 
 with the spread of Christianity. Sfc Augustine himself 
 established the see of Fussala in 423. The Donatists 
 had been especially strong there, but his determined 
 efforts had regained the district for Catholicism, and as 
 it was too far from Hippo to permit of his personal 
 supervision, he obtained the leave of his Primate and 
 carved the new diocese out of the territory of his own 
 see 8 . 
 
 Although the supporters of this system could point 
 to the example of the great Bishop of Hippo, there can 
 be no doubt that on the whole the precedent was a bad 
 one. It was very difficult, if not impossible, to ensure 
 a proper standard of education, probity and morality 
 amongst so large an episcopate. The failings of the 
 clergy, already noticed, were no doubt largely due to 
 this system, and its bad effects were increased by 
 another peculiarity of the African Church. The 
 
 1 Canon 5. 2 Canon 4. 
 
 3 St Augustine, Ep. 209. 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 41 
 
 Primates of the provinces were appointed, not by 
 merit but by seniority. In every province, except 
 Proconsularis, the senior member of the episcopate, or 
 "Senex" as he was called, held the Primacy as a matter 
 of course 1 ; the age, infirmity or other unfitness of a 
 bishop, the insignificance or remoteness of his see, 
 were no obstacles to his appointment, and not even 
 Gregory the Great could get this curious system 
 altered 2 - The only exception to this rule was the 
 province of Proconsularis. Here the Bishop of Car- 
 thage was always Primate ; indeed he wielded an 
 authority over the whole African Church; to him all 
 disputes about the appointments of other Primates 
 were to be brought 3 , and by him the election of all 
 bishops and their translation from one diocese to another 
 had to be approved 4 . 
 
 This unique system had unique results. The most 
 influential bishop was by no means always the nominal 
 Primate. St Augustine was never Primate of Nu- 
 midia ; St Fulgentius was only Bishop of Ruspe ; yet 
 both profoundly affected the course of African Chris- 
 tianity. In fact under this system the divorce between 
 real and nominal power was often complete and great 
 jealousies constantly arose. In the days of Gregory 
 the Great the influence of his friend Columbus far 
 exceeded that of the Primate, and his close relation 
 with the Pope brought on him the greatest odium. If 
 position and authority had coincided in his case much of 
 
 1 Bingham, Antiquities of the Christian Church, II. xvi. 6. 
 
 2 Bpp. i. 74, 77. 
 
 3 Council of Hippo, 393, Canon 4 (1st Series). 
 
 4 Council of Carthage, 397, Canon 7. 
 
42 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 this would have been avoided ; but the system was at 
 fault, and those who tried to provide a remedy only 
 laid themselves open to misconception and failure. 
 
 In later times a means of correcting the errors of a 
 Church existed, which had not yet been fully established. 
 In the fifth century the Pope had not obtained the great 
 powers over all Catholics which he wielded later, and 
 Africa in particular regarded his claims with suspicion. 
 About the year 418 a case arose in the Proconsular 
 province which clearly denned the relations between 
 Carthage and Home. Bishop Urban of Sicca had 
 deposed a priest named Apiarius for very serious 
 crimes ; the accused appealed to Pope Zosimus and 
 was reinstated by him. The General Council of Africa, 
 which met on May 1st, 418, at once passed a canon 
 forbidding any cleric below the rank of bishop to appeal 
 across the sea. Zosimus despatched Bishop Faustinus 
 of Potentina and two priests to protest against this 
 decision and to demand that the Church of Africa 
 should allow bishops, condemned by their provincial 
 councils, to appeal to Rome, and priests and deacons 
 condemned by their own diocesans, to appeal to the 
 other prelates of the neighbourhood. These, said the 
 legates, were canons passed by the Council of Nicaea. 
 
 The African bishops were not convinced that these 
 canons were genuine, and the Council of Carthage of 
 419 ordered an application to be made to the Churches 
 of Constantinople, Alexandria and Antioch for authentic 
 versions of the decrees of Nicaea. Meanwhile through 
 reverence for Rome the canons were temporarily ac- 
 cepted, and Apiarius was permitted to resume his priestly 
 functions, although to avoid scandal he was not allowed 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 43 
 
 to minister again in Sicca. Unfortunately for the Pope 
 the investigation shewed that Carthage was right and 
 Rome was wrong ; neither St Cyril of Alexandria nor 
 Bishop Atticus of Constantinople admitted that these 
 canons had been passed at Nicaea, and it was dis- 
 covered that they were taken from the decrees of the 
 Council of Sardica of 343. Moreover, the conduct of 
 Faustinus and Apiarius was not calculated to soothe 
 the Church of Africa into a yielding mood. The former 
 angered the Carthaginian bishops by his insolence; 
 the latter asked the help of Boniface and Celestine, 
 the successors of Zosimus, in his reinstatement at Sicca, 
 though he had admitted the truth of the terrible accu- 
 sations against him. Consequently the Council of 
 Carthage of 424 wrote to Celestine asking the recall 
 of Faustinus, repudiating the so-called Nicene Canons, 
 and declaring that appeals to Rome were an attack on 
 the rights of the African Church. 
 
 So ended the controversy. The last Council at 
 which the affair was discussed was held only four years 
 before the Vandal invasion, and while the influence of 
 St Augustine was at its prime. Position and historical 
 prestige might belong to the Bishop of Rome ; repu- 
 tation and moral weight rested with the Bishop of 
 Hippo. What result would have ensued if the circum- 
 stances of the time and the influence of the two leaders 
 had been different, it is impossible to say. Later on 
 when the Arian invaders had destroyed the organization 
 of the Catholics of Carthage, the advice and aid of the 
 Pope was sought with much greater earnestness ; but 
 at the beginning of the fifth century it is clear that 
 the claims of Rome met with little encouragement in 
 
44 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Africa. What the Pope could claim through the 
 canons of the (Ecumenical Councils, he got ; and his 
 advice was treated with respect ; but further than that 
 Africa would not go, and it asserted the absolute right 
 to manage its own affairs after its own fashion 1 . 
 
 The African Church in thus repudiating all external 
 interference, and with such a loose internal constitution, 
 had ample scope to display the two qualities which 
 particularly mark its early history. On the one hand 
 it shewed the most intense convictiou, on the other 
 the wildest intolerance. Though closely connected, 
 these characteristics produced the most different re- 
 sults. The noble stedfastness which could support 
 St Perpetua in the hour of her death, and the zealous 
 faith which made hundreds prefer martyrdom to 
 apostasy, rooted Christianity firmly in Africa ; but the 
 narrow fanaticism, which made some condemn Cyprian 
 and Caecilian, the mad zeal, which rent the Church by 
 schisms, and provoked the fanatic violence of the Cir- 
 cumcelliones, did incalculable harm. 
 
 The intolerance of the Africans made their country 
 the soil from which schism first sprang into being. 
 The two first schisms arose in Carthage : the earliest 
 during the episcopate of St Cyprian, which when trans- 
 planted to Rome was known as Novatianism, and this 
 was followed by the so-called Donatist schism, which 
 arose on the question of the power of a bishop who had 
 denied the Faith to confer the apostolical succession. The 
 motives of the schismatics were not wholly unworthy and 
 in judging their action allowance must be made for one 
 
 ' For this controversy, see Hefele, Vol. 11. pages 463 — 7, 476 — 8, 
 and 128, 137. 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 45 
 
 of the most cherished convictions of the Africans, who 
 believed most strongly that the validity of a sacrament 
 depended directly on the character and orthodoxy of 
 the officiating minister. If the priest or bishop were 
 excommunicate, all sacerdotal acts done by him were 
 ipso facto null and void ; and the feeling of anxiety 
 amongst the mass of the Christians of Africa, when 
 they heard grave charges brought against the Primate 
 of their Church was naturally intense. Undoubtedly 
 such feeling animated the best of the followers of 
 Novatian and Donatus, but unfortunately, in both cases, 
 other and less worthy motives seem to have been at 
 work among the leaders of these schisms. If for 
 example it was quite clear that Felicissimus had 
 no need to fear a rigorous enquiry into his trusteeship 
 of the Church funds, his credit would be much higher, 
 for in his case there was a real excuse for at least 
 an examination of the conduct of the Bishop of 
 Carthage. There is no doubt whatever that Cyprian 
 acted wisely and prudently in fleeing from the heat of 
 the persecution; nor were there in the later affair of 
 Caecilian any certain proofs of the guilt of his con- 
 secrators. But at the same time it is most important 
 to remember the African point of view, and to 
 realise that a man who thinks that the efficacy of 
 the sacraments depends on the personal purity of the 
 priest must have looked upon the charges against the 
 heads of his Church with the utmost horror and 
 alarm. 
 
 Novatianism and Donatism though springing from 
 similar causes had very different endings ; Cyprian was 
 soon able to suppress the former ; the latter probably 
 
46 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 existed for four hundred years. For the stern discipline 
 of Novatian found uncongenial soil in Africa, and 
 Cyprian by his wise moderation and gradual restora- 
 tion of the lapsed made the return to the Church as 
 easy as he could for the followers of Felicissimus. 
 Moreover, the actual state of affairs in Carthage afforded 
 no excuse for the establishment of a new Church on 
 the basis of no compromise with the pagan persecutors. 
 Nearly all the Christians had complied in one way or 
 another with the demands of the government, and in 
 the time of peril it had been difficult to find enough 
 priests to perform the daily services. It was absurd 
 for such men to condemn Cyprian for his flight, and 
 many of them viewed with the utmost anxiety the 
 setting up of a rival episcopate. The mercy of Cyprian 
 was therefore gladly received, and when in 258 the 
 great bishop sealed his faith with his blood, the influ- 
 ence of the sectarians was finally checked. In other 
 countries Novatianism shewed much vitality, but in the 
 land of its birth it was already dead. 
 
 In sharp contrast to the rapid decline of this schism 
 is the history of the temporary success of Donatism. 
 Perhaps the want of a great man to nip the revolt in 
 the bud, perhaps the slackening of discipline as the 
 Church grew in size was the cause of its rapid spread, 
 but for one reason or another the followers of Donatus 
 became so numerous that they threatened to absorb 
 altogether the orthodox Church. 
 
 In tracing the causes of the extinction of African 
 Christianity there is no need to go at length into the 
 wearisome story of this great schism ; for it is a great 
 but not uncommon error to pronounce it one of the chief 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 47 
 
 reasons for the fall of the Church. Donatism was at 
 its full prosperity at the end of the fourth century; 
 African Christianity was not ruined till the end of the 
 seventh century. The three hundred years that inter- 
 vened were full of the most momentous events, which 
 had far more influence upon the destruction of the 
 Church than the progress of the schism or the crimes 
 of its supporters. Indeed the prosperity of Donatism 
 was comparatively short-lived, and by the time of the 
 Vandals was nearly extinct ; the efforts of St Augustine 
 and its own excesses had crushed its strength, and the few 
 remnants of the great party that survived in Numidia in 
 the days of the first Gregory were too small to be of any 
 account. 
 
 The Donatist schism has however an interest quite 
 distinct from its actual merits and its theological 
 aspect. Viewed from the political standpoint it stands 
 revealed as meaning much more than an ecclesiastical 
 quarrel. It seems to be the expression of the antagon- 
 ism of national interests and characters, which found an 
 easier outlet in the loosely-knit fabric of the Church 
 than it could ever have had in the political organization 
 of the Eoman Empire. At the beginning of the fourth 
 century the form of Christianity was not yet settled, 
 and it was even doubtful whether the state would 
 abandon paganism ; on the other hand there was small 
 hope of success for a people rebelling against the might 
 of the Empire. The field of theology became therefore 
 the battle-ground of nations. Arianism was the creed 
 of the Teutons ; Catholicism of Rome. The victory of 
 the first would have implied not only a theological 
 but a political change, and the success of the latter 
 
48 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 shewed that with all its spreading decay the Empire 
 was still able to defeat its enemies. 
 
 The rise of Donatism in such circumstances gave it 
 its larger meaning. At first merely a protest against the 
 irregular ordination of Caecilian as Bishop of Carthage, 
 closely akin to the history of Novatianism, it gradually 
 widened out until it assumed the character of the 
 partisan creed of all who harboured Moorish sentiments 
 and dissatisfaction with the established regime. Even 
 at its birth the schism drew its chief strength from 
 Numidia, one of the least Romanized parts of Africa. 
 The opposition to Mensurius and Caecilian was begun 
 by the provincial council of Cirta, under the leadership 
 of Secundus, Bishop of Tigisis, and the summons of the 
 leaders of the Church of Carthage before this assembly 
 was practically, if not as yet deliberately, an attempt 
 to expose ecclesiastics of the ruling race to the censure 
 of the provincials. In a few more years the Donatists 
 had received very questionable allies. The Circum- 
 celliones were Roman subjects only in name. They 
 spoke Punic alone, and it was into that language 
 that St Augustine proposed his discussion with Bishop 
 Crispinus of Calama should be translated, when he 
 wished to reach the ears of the rank and file of the 
 party 1 . Their violence and blind fanaticism proclaims 
 them largely Moorish in blood, and they were probably 
 sprung from those semi-barbarian peasants and moun- 
 taineers who formed the connecting link between the 
 inhabitants of the sea-coast and the uncivilized Berbers 
 of the frontiers. The Donatist party therefore included 
 
 1 Aug. Ep. 66. 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 49 
 
 a very large Moorish element, and its hatred of Catho- 
 licism was bound up and strengthened by the national 
 dislike of the Roman rule. It seems, moreover, to have 
 gained great strength under the tyrannies of Firmus 
 and Gildo, and had become so numerous that its 
 members were estimated as more than the Catholics. 
 Probably the leaders of the national party found it to 
 their interest to champion the cause of the Donatists 
 against the Catholics, and at any rate the edict of 
 Honorius, issued as soon as he recovered his power, 
 against the violators of the Catholics, proves that he 
 regarded the defence of the orthodox as most im- 
 portant to the State. 
 
 But Donatism may be regarded from a social and 
 economic as well as from a political aspect. Like 
 the Socialism and Anarchism of the present day it 
 attracted all those discontented with their lot. Bank- 
 rupts, runaway slaves and fraudulent debtors swelled its 
 ranks and tried to destroy the records against them- 
 selves by pillaging and ravaging in the sacred name of 
 religion 1 . It became the gathering in which all that 
 was unwholesome and corrupt in the State came to 
 a head, and it embodied in its ranks every evil thing 
 which the decaying social condition of the Empire had 
 produced. Amongst such men, opposed to all law and 
 order, the grossest immorality prevailed ; and in their 
 company were found ' troops of homeless women who 
 declined matrimony, that they might avoid restraint 2 .' 
 
 The victory of Donatism would have implied not 
 merely a religious but a social and political revolution, 
 
 1 Aug., Ep. 185, iv. 15. 2 Aug., Ep. 35, § 2. 
 
 H. 4 
 
50 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 and it could expect no greater mercy from the Em- 
 perors than it obtained. At its very beginning, before 
 it had assumed more than a theological aspect, Constan- 
 tine, perhaps thinking Christianity should be as much 
 subject to the Emperor as Paganism, had punished 
 the schismatics, like rebels, with death. Constans, 
 angered at the excesses of the Circumcelliones, and 
 their refusal of his clemency, drove them from the 
 province. Valentinian, Gratian and Theodosius issued 
 edict after edict against them and the whole machinery 
 of the Roman power was employed to crush the turbu- 
 lent sect which threatened the province with a reign of 
 immorality and rapine. 
 
 While the State attacked it in the name of social 
 order, it now met its greatest opponent in the champion 
 of theology and religious orthodoxy. In 391, St Augus- 
 tine went to Hippo ; two years later he was chosen 
 to preach the sermon before the Council of Hippo ; and 
 in 395 was ordained bishop as coadjutor to the aged 
 Valerius. He had already begun his long literary war- 
 fare against the power of the Donatists with his 
 " Psalmus contra partem Donati," and five years later 
 he wrote his first book against Petilian. 
 
 Yet though within a quarter of a century the 
 Donatists were destined to be almost swept away, there 
 seemed small hope at the death of Theodosius of the 
 ultimate triumph of Catholicism. The failing power 
 of the Empire, the rising strength of the Moors, the 
 diminishing numbers of the orthodox seemed to fore- 
 tell the rapidly approaching extinction of the Roman 
 influence, secular and ecclesiastical, in the province of 
 Africa. However this was not to be, and the Donatists 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 51 
 
 themselves did much to cause their own fall. The 
 usual fate of schismatics overtook them and schism 
 begat schism. In breaking away from the Catholic 
 Church, on conscientious grounds, they had established 
 a precedent, the validity of which it was hard for them 
 to deny if any serious dispute arose amongst them- 
 selves. Three secessions followed close upon each other 
 and materially weakened their numbers. In 370, the 
 Rogatists, as the followers of Rogatus of Cartenna were 
 called, separated from the main body. In 380 the 
 excommunication of Tyconius, the solitary philosopher 
 belonging to this sect, was invested with an importance 
 due to his high character and abilities. In 393, the 
 action of Primian, Donatist bishop of Carthage, caused 
 a serious quarrel, which resulted in the formation of 
 a new sect, called after their bishop, Maximianists. 
 
 It was not however merely through loss of numbers 
 that these divisions harmed the Donatists. Far more 
 damaging were the opportunities they afforded to the 
 Catholics of criticizing the mutual relations of the 
 various parties. In 394, at a great Donatist council 
 held at Bagai, the Primianists had solemnly excom- 
 municated the Maximianists and decreed persecution 
 against them. But this was beyond their power, and 
 though great atrocities were committed when the 
 Primianists were strong, they were forced to leave 
 unmolested and even to recognise some of the leaders 
 of the Maximianists. This opportunist policy put 
 into the hands of St Augustine a double-edged weapon 
 which he was far too skilled a dialectician to neglect. 
 Again and again he comments on the inconsistency of 
 the party of no compromise in compromising with their 
 
 4—2 
 
52 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 opponents 1 ; again and again he asks why the Primianists 
 repudiate the Orders of the Catholics and acknowledge 
 those of the Maximianists ; again and again he urges 
 the State to mete out to the Donatists the same 
 measure of persecution as they had measured to their 
 enemies 2 . It was not without success that St Augustine 
 threw himself heart and soul into the fray. His 
 trenchant criticisms were unanswerable and he gained 
 many converts. The sight of three separate sects, each 
 bitterly hostile to the others and each boasting that 
 they alone were free from guilt as " traditores," must 
 have awakened disquieting thoughts amongst all the 
 best of the Donatist party. The prestige of the schism 
 was lost ; its political support was gone ; it had to 
 rely solely on its own inherent merits in contending 
 against the policy of mingled severity and conciliation 
 which St Augustine was now to organize. 
 
 One further point about the Donatists is worth 
 noticing ; they afford an illustration of the turning of 
 evil into good by the Almighty Hand of God. Donatism 
 was deeply tinged with those national and social sym- 
 pathies which were peculiarly suited to the Moorish 
 temperament. The violence and blind ferocity of 
 the Circumcelliones stamp them as having within 
 their ranks a large number of barbarians without a 
 trace of civilization, and the sect seems to have been 
 especially supported by Firmus and Gildo, the Moorish 
 leaders. Moreover when it was crushed and driven 
 from the more cultivated plains, it lingered on among 
 the mountains of Numidia and Mauritania for nearly 
 
 1 Epp. 51, 53, 70. 2 Ep. 93. 
 
THE AFRICAN CHURCH TO 398 A.D. 53 
 
 two centuries. With all its illogicality and all its ex- 
 cesses there was something in Donatism which appealed 
 especially to the Moors. It attracted those whom the 
 purer and more regulated teachings of Catholicism 
 could not reach ; it spread the Gospel of Christ amongst 
 tribes beyond the ken of civilization, and it was the 
 first teacher of those who were to preserve their faith 
 through centuries of Mahommedan persecution. Viewed 
 in this way Donatism would seem not the weakening 
 of African Christianity, but the very means which 
 under the guiding hand of God first spread and then 
 strengthened for years of trial the Kingdom of Christ. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 The Golden Age of the African Church. 
 
 The thirty years between the fall of Gildo and the 
 Vandal invasion cover the most prosperous period in 
 the history of the African Church and are inseparably 
 bound up with the acts of one great man. St Augus- 
 tine of Hippo, though bishop of a provincial town of 
 the Roman Empire, by the sheer force of his character 
 and intellect not only restored the supremacy to the 
 Catholic Church in Africa, but exercised an almost 
 unbounded influence upon Western Christendom. In 
 Africa he was not only the fearless opponent of all 
 schism and heresy, whether Donatism, Pelagianism or 
 Manichaeism, but the patriotic inspirer of a strenuous 
 resistance to both Moorish and Vandal attacks. His 
 influence in the Church, unequalled in his own age, has 
 hardly diminished in the course of centuries. While he 
 lived his authority was admitted by all, and he stirred 
 up the Church to resist the heresies of Pelagius ; after 
 his death his writings retained their original value, and 
 to this day are reckoned amongst the noblest contribu- 
 tions to Christian literature. He was fortunate in the 
 period in which he lived, but he used his opportunities 
 
THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE AFRICAN CHURCH. 55 
 
 thoroughly and well. He was consecrated a.d. 391, 
 three years before the restoration of Roman authority 
 in Africa, and he died two years after the arrival of the 
 Vandals ; but, with the exception of these five years, 
 the days of his episcopate were on the whole a time of 
 tranquillity for the province. But though the state of 
 secular affairs was as quiet as could be expected under 
 the failing emperors, there were many enemies for the 
 ecclesiastical leaders to meet. Against all these St 
 Augustine waged a bitter war, and the restoration alike 
 of orthodoxy and organization to the African Church in 
 428 was almost entirely due to his efforts. 
 
 In 398 the tyranny of Gildo came to an end and 
 a temporary prosperity was given to the province. 
 Under Gildo and Firmus, its two Moorish leaders, Africa 
 had been steadily falling into great disorder. For 
 twelve years licentiousness and rapine had unbridled 
 sway. To possess wealth or a beautiful wife was to be 
 marked out for oppression ; to refuse the tyrant's 
 demands was to court certain and cruel death. False 
 accusations or treacherous hospitalities removed all who 
 opposed the despot, and their widows were forced to 
 become his slaves and dancing-girls or to marry some 
 Berber courtier. The very coloni were not safe in their 
 obscurity, and the greed of Gildo and his favourites 
 turned many out of their ancestral farms 1 . 
 
 Meanwhile Donatism triumphed on every side, over 
 Catholicism, enlisting in its ranks all the religious, 
 social and economic discontent of the province. At one 
 time the schismatics seemed destined to become the 
 
 1 Claudian, De Bella Gildonico, 166, etc. 
 
56 THE CHEISTIAN CHURCHES IN NOETH AFRICA. 
 
 only religious body in Africa. Their organization spread 
 like a net over the whole province ; in every village 
 they had a priest, in every town a bishop, and in the 
 uncivilized border districts they were exceptionally 
 strong. Whole congregations with their priests deserted 
 Catholicism and the new doctrines had a peculiar 
 fascination for the young. There was even a real fear 
 that it would be impossible to keep up the numbers of 
 the orthodox priesthood, and an appeal was made to 
 Milan and Rome to fill the vacancies in the ranks of 
 the higher clergy 1 . 
 
 However a change soon came. The power of Gildo 
 crumbled into dust at the first touch and the supremacy 
 of Rome in temporal matters was at once restored. To 
 restore Catholic authority in spiritual affairs was much 
 more difficult, and many years elapsed before the mass 
 of the provincials returned to the bosom of the true 
 Church. 
 
 The attack upon Donatism was twofold, and both 
 the secular and ecclesiastical authorities did their best 
 to stamp out the pestilent schism. For the Roman 
 official regarded the followers of Donatus as much more 
 than fanatical partisans in an obscure disciplinary 
 dispute. He feared them as determined supporters of 
 the national movement amongst the Moors. He saw 
 that they were the opponents of established order, who 
 were sometimes guilty of the wildest acts of anarchy and 
 violence. Debtors and runaway slaves, half civilised 
 Moors and dissolute women, wandered in bands through- 
 out the country, exacting money and destroying 
 
 1 Council of Carthage, 401. Aug., Ep. 61. 
 
THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE AFRICAN CHURCH. 57 
 
 property wherever they went. The Catholics especially 
 were the mark for their violence ; and, where the 
 Donatists were strong, neither life nor wealth was secure 
 to those who differed from them. In some quiet spot, far 
 removed from the protection of the soldiers, a wild 
 horde of Circumcelliones would suddenly appear and 
 all would be confusion and bloodshed. The granaries 
 were burnt ; the wine and vinegar were wasted ; the 
 farmers were forced with blows to grind their corn at 
 the mill, and all who dared to resist were beaten to 
 death with cudgels. Against the Catholics still greater 
 outrages were committed. Their churches were de- 
 stroyed, their sacred vessels were profaned, and their 
 clergy were blinded with lime or tortured and slain 1 . 
 
 No doubt the more respectable Donatists had no 
 share in these brutalities and were unable to check 
 them, but the civil officials were either unable or 
 unwilling to distinguish between the two sections of 
 the party, and classed both as enemies of the Empire. 
 In truth the possession of Africa and the security of her 
 fields were absolute necessities for the Imperial City, 
 and no emperor could view with equanimity the 
 growing anarchy of the province. As soon then as 
 Gildo was crushed Honorius issued an edict proscribing 
 the whole sect and ordaining death as the punishment 
 of all who violated the churches or molested the priests 
 of the Catholics. From this time onwards the policy 
 of the State was firmly defined. Donatism and all 
 its followers were condemned, and were always liable to- 
 the most rigorous punishments at the hands of the 
 secular authorities. 
 
 1 Aug., Ep. 185, et passim. 
 
58 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 The theological attack upon the schismatics was just 
 as determined ; and was directed and led by St Augus- 
 tine. The success of the Catholics was practically 
 complete, and the gradual defeat of the Donatists is 
 clearly shewn by the changes in the policy adopted by 
 the Church. At first St Augustine, though unshaken 
 in his resolution to overcome the schism, evidently feels 
 a marked respect for his opponents. He sees that he is 
 dealing with a party as strong as his own, and that 
 confidence in his own position and argumentative skill 
 are his only weapons. He invites Prpculeianus to a 
 conference, and will, if his adversary prefers it, stand 
 aside himself in favour of a less redoubtable Catholic 1 . 
 He actually held a discussion with the Donatist 
 Bishop Fortunius at Tibursi, and contended by letters 
 with Bishop Honoratus and the priest Crispinus ; more- 
 over, when the latter was consecrated to the see of 
 Calama, he shewed an eagerness to resume their long 
 controversy 2 . 
 
 For St Augustine did not shut his eyes to obvious 
 facts, and he saw that apart from all other considerations 
 Donatism was a great power and must be treated 
 accordingly. The influence of the sect was immense 
 and on all neutral points its friendship was well worth 
 gaining. He therefore complained bitterly of the 
 damage done to religion and morality by the laxity 
 with which the schismatics received men smarting 
 under the censures of the Catholic Church, and quoted 
 particular instances. A son who had beaten his mother, 
 a sub-deacon and some nuns whom he had sentenced 
 
 1 Aug., Epp. 33—5. 2 Aug., Ep. 51. 
 
THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE AFRICAN CHURCH. 59 
 
 to penance, were freely admitted to the ranks of the 
 Donatists, and all order was thereby endangered. It 
 would be far better, he urged, if some arrangement 
 was adopted by the two parties and each agreed to 
 carry out the just censures imposed by its opponents or 
 any who came over to its side. He had himself 
 always done so, and could cite cases in which he had 
 protected Donatists in spite of insults and contumely. 
 Thus he had saved the daughter of a catechumen from 
 a beating by her angry father for joining the schis- 
 matics, submitting to rebaptism, and becoming a nun ; 
 and on the other hand he had not sought to avenge the 
 gross insults he had received from the Donatists 1 . 
 
 This semi-recognition of his opponents was still 
 preserved by St Augustine, even when the general drift 
 of his policy towards them was completely changed. 
 For as soon as the authority of the emperors was 
 re-established in Africa, the tide turned and the 
 Catholics began to rapidly recover power. As the} 7 saw 
 themselves growing steadily stronger they assumed a 
 more triumphant tone, while they managed to keep 
 the door open for the schismatics' return. The first 
 intimation of their altered policy is given in the corre- 
 spondence of St Augustine, probably written in 400. 
 He has learned now that something more than moral 
 suasion is necessary, and he urges Celer, an important 
 official, who had himself come over from the Donatists, 
 to use greater vigour against his old associates 2 . In 
 the next year he wrote to Pammachius, a Numidian of 
 senatorial rank, thanking him for compelling his tenants 
 
 1 Aug., Ep. 35. 2 Epp. 56—7. 
 
60 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 to see the error of their ways, and remarking that the 
 most important matter for consideration was the manner 
 in which the Donatist clergy were to be received 1 . 
 
 The great bishop contributed greatly to the solution 
 of this problem by frankly acknowledging the eccle- 
 siastical standing of his adversaries, and thereby 
 smoothing the path of return. The policy adopted 
 by the Council of Carthage in 401 followed certain 
 broad lines. The Donatists were schismatics, not 
 heretics, and there was no reason why the Orders and 
 Baptism conferred by them should not be acknowledged: 
 in the same way, if any Donatist had taken vows of 
 chastity or self-denial, he should not be released on 
 joining the Catholic communion 2 . St Augustine him- 
 self received and recognized the schismatically-ordained 
 deacons, but he sternly refused to palliate in any way 
 the crime of those Catholic deacons who had left the 
 true fold of the Church. 
 
 These wise and salutary measures were too success- 
 ful in winning Donatists to the Church to allow 
 Catholics to dream of calling in the assistance of the 
 secular arm. St Augustine proposed to alter the penalty 
 of death decreed against all heretical and DoDatist clergy 
 to the infliction of a fine of ten pounds of gold, and 
 urged a more rigorous enforcement of the law in the 
 parts where the Circumcelliones were strong. His 
 scheme was laid before the Emperor by the Council 
 of 401, and might have been adopted, if further out- 
 breaks, and one outrage in particular, had not occurred 
 before the arrival of the deputation at Eome. Maxi- 
 
 1 Ep. 58. 2 Ep. 61. 
 
THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE AFRICAN CHURCH. 61 
 
 mianus, Bishop of Bagai, had excited the anger of the 
 Donatists by successfully claiming from them in the 
 law-courts the basilica of Fundus Oalvianus. He was 
 set upon in the church itself, beaten with cudgels and 
 brands, torn from the altar, stabbed in the groin, 
 dragged along the ground and abandoned for dead. 
 The Catholics found him and bore him away, but as 
 the sad procession proceeded on its way singing psalms 
 it was assaulted and the senseless prelate once more 
 seized by his enemies. He was then carried to the 
 summit of a lofty tower and thrown over, but luckily he 
 fell softly (molliter) upon a heap of refuse, where he lay 
 until a chance passer-by heard his groans and took him 
 by night to his friends. In spite of his wounds he re- 
 covered, but the fresh scars, more in number than the 
 members of his body 1 , bore witness to the treatment he 
 had received 2 . This outrage urged the Emperor to 
 increased rigour, and the Church also soon saw the 
 necessity of more severity, for the Council of Carthage 
 of 404 requested the energetic enforcement of the 
 law of Theodosius against heretics. 
 
 St Augustine furnishes the best defence of this 
 change of policy 3 . He instances the horrible brutalities 
 of the Circumcelliones, and roundly assertsihat "perhaps 
 the cruelties of the barbarians would be light in com- 
 parison." He declares that these fanatics were pledged 
 to subvert the social order of the province, that they 
 repudiated just debts and released legal slaves. Their 
 conduct deprived them of all claim to the consideration 
 due to those who had honestly made a mistake. If they 
 
 1 "plures in ejus corpore cicatrices quam membra numerantur." 
 
 2 Aug., Epp. 88, 185, vii. 25—7. 3 Epp. 70, 51, 53, 106. 
 
62 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 were really conscientious in their opposition to the 
 Catholics, why did they tolerate the Maximianists? 
 The alleged grievances against both were identical, 
 yet the Donatists refused to acknowledge Catholic 
 Orders and Sacraments whilst admitting the validity 
 of those dispensed by the Maximianists. Such a policy 
 shewed the real hollowness of the whole dispute from a 
 theological standpoint, and made it impossible to avoid 
 the conviction that party spirit had more to do with 
 its persistence than love of truth. 
 
 For if they were truly actuated by love of truth, 
 why, urged Augustine, had they refused the offers of 
 a friendly conference, which had been continually urged 
 upon them previously, and even renewed so lately as 
 403 1 1 Then Possidius and Augustine had offered to 
 meet in argument any champions whom their party 
 might select, but Primian, the Donatist Bishop of Car- 
 thage, had refused. Let things therefore take their 
 course. Now the time for peaceful methods was past 
 and the time for ' wholesome medicine ' had begun 2 . 
 After all it was no more than the Donatists had wished 
 to inflict on their own friends, the Maximianists 3 ; and 
 not more than they had asked Constantine to enforce 
 against their opponents the Catholics. Besides, the 
 door of return was always held open to them and full 
 recognition was granted to their baptism and orders. 
 
 The downfall of Donatism now begins. It was 
 impossible for the schismatics long to resist the 
 persecution of the government, aided as it was by the 
 noble and statesmanlike policy of the Church in offering 
 
 1 See also Epp. 87, 8. 2 Ep. 93. 3 Ep. 88. 
 
THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE AFRICAN CHURCH. 63 
 
 an easy way for the retraction of their errors. There 
 is no need to describe in detail the progress of the 
 Church or to go fully into the mad outbreaks of the 
 despairing Circumcelliones ; it will be sufficient to men- 
 tion briefly the chief landmarks of the great change. 
 
 In 405, Honorius issued his new edict at the re- 
 quest of the Council of Carthage of the preceding year. 
 All those who ill-treated the Catholics were to be 
 fined ; the Donatist bishops and clergy were to be 
 banished ; rebaptism was forbidden, and those who sub- 
 mitted to it were to lose their goods and their churches 
 and were deprived of the right of testamentary dis- 
 position. Moreover, schismatics were now authorita- 
 tively classed with heretics. The result was immediate. 
 Many waverers came over, and open union took place 
 between the majority of the Donatists and the Catholics 
 in many great cities, notably at Carthage. Of course 
 there were outbreaks of violence amongst the Circum- 
 celliones, and especially in the neighbourhood of Hippo 
 and in Numidia ; and Augustine had to warn the new 
 " magister officiorum " of the danger in which all the 
 Catholics stood, and urged him to make it known that 
 the strong measures taken were initiated not by 
 Stilicho, but by the Emperor himself 1 
 
 In 411, a great Conference was held at Carthage. 
 The bishops on each side were to attend in their full 
 strength, and seven champions for each party aided 
 by seven bishops were to argue the points in dispute. 
 The speeches were to be officially taken down, and at 
 the end of the third day the President, the Proconsul 
 
 1 Aug., Ep. 97. 
 
64 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Marcellinus, was to deliver his decision. However the 
 Donatists, knowing the weakness of their cause, pre- 
 vented any reasonable discussion by their character- 
 istic violence. The first two days were completely 
 wasted through frivolous objections raised to the formal 
 preliminaries. On the third day, after a stormy argu- 
 ment on the question of the inclusion or exclusion of 
 sinners from the Church on earth, the President's 
 authority forced the conference into the practical 
 channel of the historical causes of the schism. Then 
 at length Marcellinus was able to deliver judgment. 
 He began by declaring first, that the official ' acta ' 
 proved that Caecilian had not been guilty of giving up 
 the Scriptures ; secondly that, even if he had, his sin 
 would not, according bo the Divine Law, involve all his 
 followers in his own guilt. Therefore the Donatists 
 were pronounced to have no justification whatever, 
 either historical or theological. They must then break 
 up their organization and seek readmission to the 
 Church, which they had deserted and oppressed. At 
 any rate, they must surrender their churches, and cease 
 from their outrages, and, while anyone was at liberty to 
 break up a Donatist meeting, the Catholics were not to 
 be impeded in any way. 
 
 An appeal to the Emperor on the part of the 
 defeated faction was worse than useless, and only 
 brought further penalties on their head. All Donatists 
 were to lose their rights of citizenship, and in extreme 
 cases, even their goods and lands. From this moment 
 Donatism ceased to be a power in Africa and the rest 
 of its history is the story of its death. 
 
 Augustine by his sermons converted the people 
 
THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE AFRICAN CHURCH. 65 
 
 of Cirta 1 , and by a fresh edict, published in 414, even 
 those churches, which the Donatists still retained, were 
 forfeited, the schismatic priests were banished, the fines 
 on all who remained doubled, and the right to give 
 evidence in the law-courts was taken away. In fact 
 the Donatists were now reduced to the social position 
 of the lowest class and were subjected to a slow, galling 
 persecution, which was more effective from the fact that 
 the sufferers were denied the advantage of posing in 
 public as martyrs. It is not surprising to find that a 
 special Council had to be summoned at Carthage in 
 418, to put upon a sounder basis the policy of the 
 Church towards these enforced recruits 2 . 
 
 But though Donatism was now completely stamped 
 out in the greater part of the Province, some remnants 
 still remained to cause the Church much more trouble. 
 About 408, St Augustine had informed Vincentius, 
 the Rogatist Bishop of Cartenna, in justification of his 
 harsh policy, that much of Numidia had been won 
 over 3 , and in 423 he told Pope Caelestius that his 
 success had made it necessary to set up a separate 
 bishopric at Fussala 4 . But for all that the conversion 
 was never completed, and on the borders, in the 
 debateable land, which stretched beyond the strict 
 limits of the Roman frontiers, Donatism still lingered. 
 In 417, Pope Boniface sought information about this 
 troublesome sect, and St Augustine in his reply de- 
 clared that if vast numbers of the population have 
 returned to Catholicism, a tough and turbulent minority 
 remained outside. Some had conformed through fear 
 
 1 Ep. 144. 2 Aug., " Ad Donatistas post Collationem." 
 
 3 Ep. 93. 4 Ep. 209. 
 
 H. 5 
 
66 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 of punishment, and some of those who had not con- 
 formed had been convinced of their errors; but there 
 was still grave fear that the outrages would be renewed 
 by those who had proved themselves more obstinate or 
 more courageous 1 . 
 
 But though there was this fear, and though indi- 
 viduals might still suffer from the excesses of the 
 wilder schismatics, Donatism as a dangerous force was 
 dead. By the end of St Augustine's life nothing was 
 left of this once powerful sect but a few followers in 
 the deserts of Mauritania and Numidia. They existed 
 for many centuries and gave some trouble in later 
 times; but regarded as a factor in the extinction of 
 African Christianity they are quite unimportant. 
 
 Donatism was not the only trouble of the African 
 Church at this period. Two heresies attacked the 
 faith of the Catholics at the beginning of the fifth 
 century and called for the most vigilant resistance. 
 Happily Augustine of Hippo and Aurelius of Carthage 
 were fully alive to the danger and were able to prevent 
 the people of the Province from being led astray. 
 Consequently these heresies had no influence upon the 
 fall of the African Church and may be dismissed with 
 a very few words. 
 
 In 409, Pelagius, the author of the teaching which 
 bears his name, landed in Africa and began to preach 
 his erroneous doctrines about original sin and free-will. 
 The peculiarities of the African national character 
 promised to afford him a most favourable ground on 
 which to sow his seed. For Pelagius, and still more his 
 
 1 Ep. 185, vii. 30. 
 
THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE AFRICAN CHURCH. 67 
 
 friend Caelestius, taught the absolute self-sufficiency 
 of the human will 1 . The Africans, in spite of their 
 luxuriousness, paid to personal piety and ascetic 
 austerity the most exaggerated honour, and it was 
 the very ideal of self-denial which " contributed very 
 largely to sustain and deepen that strong conviction 
 of the freedom of the human will, which the Catholic . 
 Church has always so strenuously upheld 2 ." 
 
 At first the new doctrines made rapid headway 
 and gained many converts 3 , but the firm stand of the 
 responsible heads of the Church quickly checked their 
 spread. The Council of Carthage of 412 condemned 
 Caelestius and his tenets, and St Augustine argued 
 and preached against all whom he had deceived. With 
 his personal charm, persuasive eloquence and dialectical 
 skill, the great bishop met the arguments of the 
 heretics, answered the doubts of the waverers, and 
 proved how contrary to Scripture and experience the 
 new doctrines were 4 . In 418, the Council of Carthage, 
 at which over 200 prelates were present, formulated 
 nine canons against the Pelagians, and the censures 
 of the Church were supported and enforced by the 
 edicts issued in the same year by the Emperors 
 Honorius and Theodosius 5 . When Pope Zosimus sent 
 out against the heretics an " epistola tractaria," com- 
 
 1 Augustine, De Gestis Pelag., §§ 5 — 8. 
 
 2 Lecky, History of European Morals, ii. 123. 
 
 3 Aug., De Gestis Pelag., § 62, "cum plurimo deoepisset, et fratres, 
 quos non deceperat conturbaret," and the same author says (Ep. 157, 
 § 22), " nesoiam quo sint erupturi." 
 
 4 See especially De Pecc. Meritis, De Spiritu Litteraque, De Gestis 
 Pelagii, De Natura et Gratia, and Sermons 170, 174 — 5. 
 
 5 Isidorus Hispal. Chron., Honorio et Theodesio Minore. 
 
 5—2 
 
68 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 manding all bishops to sign it under pain of depriva- 
 tion 1 , though in Italy no less than eighteen proved 
 recalcitrant, in Africa hardly any were found tainted 
 with the Pelagian errors. Indeed, so anxious was 
 Aurelius that the orthodoxy of the Province might 
 be proved, that he wrote to all his suffragans and 
 begged them to subscribe the declaration, however 
 excellent their reasons for refusing to do so might 
 appear to them to be 2 . 
 
 But the Church of Carthage was not content with 
 acting in self-defence ; it pursued its enemy wherever 
 he went. Both in Palestine and Italy Pelagius found 
 the Africans his most bitter foes. It was Orosius, the 
 friend, if not the envoy of Augustine, whose strictures 
 of the new doctrine caused the assembling of the 
 synods of Jerusalem and Diospolis at which the 
 accusers of Pelagius were inspired by the writings 
 of the great Bishop of Hippo. It was the Council 
 of Carthage of 416 which urged on Pope Innocent I. 
 to condemn Pelagianism, and it was the series of 
 African synods and especially the Carthaginian " obtes- 
 tatio " of 418, which opened the eyes of Zosimus to the 
 dangers of this error 3 . As long as it seemed likely 
 that the heresy would spread the African bishops 
 opposed it might and main. They stamped it out in 
 their own land; they discredited it before the eyes 
 of the world, and thanks to their efforts, its later 
 history is to be found in the annals of the Churches 
 of Gaul alone. 
 
 1 Apud August., Ep. 190. 
 
 2 Aurel. Carth., Ep. : Epistola Episcopis Provinc. Byzacenae. 
 
 3 Aug., Ep. 215. 
 
THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE AFRICAN CHURCH. 69 
 
 The other heresy which now affected Africa was 
 the far more subtle Manichaeism. Its converts did not 
 openly separate themselves from the orthodox, but 
 gave secret meanings to their acts while participating 
 in the ordinary public worship. It was therefore 
 particularly hard to combat and gained an alarming 
 number of votaries. Africa, indeed, seemed to be from 
 the fourth century the principal seat of the sect 1 ; St 
 Augustine himself had been won over as a young man, 
 and he had erred in company with great multitudes — 
 "cives et peregrini Christiani, tarn catholici quam etiam 
 Donatistae 2 .' Even when there was a reluctance to 
 join the sect, an uneasy feeling that its teaching might 
 after all be true made many become "auditores," in 
 order to gain such help as the " electi " could give in 
 the life beyond the grave 3 . 
 
 Manichaeism however suffered under the grievous 
 disability of being obnoxious to the temporal autho- 
 rities, whether Christian or pagan. A grave suspicion 
 of the grossest dissoluteness, which has never been 
 justified as regards the sect considered as a whole, 
 continually hung over it and caused the issue of fre- 
 quent edicts against it. Diocletian in 287, Valentinian 
 in 372, Theodosius in 382, proscribed all who adopted 
 its tenets. The efforts of the State were supported by 
 those of the Church. St Augustine wrote and argued 
 against it and was perhaps able to check its progress 4 . 
 Still it was never rooted out of Africa, and Manichaeans 
 were found there as long as the power of Rome was 
 acknowledged in the Province. On the arrival of the 
 
 1 Neander IV., 497, et seq. 2 Possidius, Vita Aug., vi. 
 
 3 Art., Encycl. Britan. ' Possidius, vi. 
 
70 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Vandals, many of its proselytes fled to Italy and caused 
 Pope Leo the Great the utmost anxiety 1 . Hunneric 
 found the Arian clergy tainted by its doctrines and 
 ordered their exile or execution at the stake 2 . When 
 Justinian reconquered the Province, a fresh edict was 
 hurled against the heretics in 540, and even in the 
 time of the Saracens many Africans believed in their 
 teachings 3 . In fact from the fourth century onwards 
 Manichaeism was widely spread through the Churches 
 of Africa; its secrecy saved it from extinction and it 
 existed as long as the strictest orthodoxy itself. 
 
 Although on the whole these thirty years seemed a 
 period of prosperity, and although the position of the 
 Church in 428 was far stronger than in 398, there 
 was one danger which became more pressing every 
 year as the time went on. It threatened, not only the 
 Church, but the whole fabric of the Roman power, 
 and it was felt not only in Africa but wherever the 
 Imperial eagles flew. On every frontier of the Empire 
 the barbarians continually advanced, and it was during 
 these years that the Berber forces began to make head- 
 way against the garrison of Africa. It was not indeed 
 a new peril. It had always been there and was in- 
 separable from the condition of affairs in Africa. As 
 far back as the time of Cyprian, the Moors had proved 
 their power. They had advanced as far as the range of 
 Ferratus and fixed their permanent boundaries there. 
 From the security of inaccessible mountain retreats, 
 they issued to plunder and ravage the fertile plains. 
 The settlers were carried off and held to ransom ; 
 
 1 Sermon, xv. 2 Victor Vit. ii. 1. 
 
 3 Greg. II., Ep. 124. 
 
THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE AFRICAN CHURCH. 71 
 
 travellers were stopped, robbed and sometimes mur- 
 dered ; and the scattered Soman posts and the militia 
 or "limitanei" could do little to make the border 
 secure. At one time the Moors had seized Christians 
 from eight different Sees, to rescue whom St Cyprian 
 raised a subscription of eight hundred pounds of gold 
 from the people of Carthage. The revolts of Firmus 
 and Gildo had been national movements towards inde- 
 pendence, and the Moors, foiled in these attempts, 
 harassed the masters, whom they could not overcome. 
 
 The circumstances of the time gave them many 
 opportunities. The Empire of the West was tottering 
 to its fall, and the great proconsuls of the provinces 
 were impatient of their subjection to Rome. Heraclian, 
 Count of Africa from 409 to 413, though he had re- 
 sisted the temptations of Attalus, threw off his 
 allegiance to Honorius and invaded Italy itself; when, 
 as the chronicler tersely says, he lost his honour and 
 his life. Ten years later another pretender arose in 
 the Province. John claimed the throne left vacant by 
 Honorius and tried to conquer Africa, which Boniface 
 held in the interests of Valentinian III. and his mother, 
 ■Galla Placidia. Finally Boniface himself revolted and 
 defended himself successfully against the combined 
 force and fraud of Mavortius, Galbio and Sinex. He 
 had after this to wage war with Sigisvult and seems in 
 desperation to have summoned the aid of the Vandals 
 from across the sea'. 
 
 The Moorish tribes, always turbulent and hard to 
 repress, must have been blind indeed, if they had not 
 
 1 Prospey, s. a., 416, 427 — 8, 431, and article in English Historical 
 Heview, July, 1887, by Prof. Freeman. 
 
72 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 seen in the disloyalty and quarrels of the Counts of 
 Africa exceptional opportunities for pillage and rapine. 
 St Augustine's letters shew that they did not let their 
 chances slip 1 . They made their usual incursions with 
 more than their usual audacity and success. Thus in 
 November, 409, they raided Sitifis and carried off a 
 professed virgin, the daughter of Bishop Severus. 
 Happily for her, her three captors were restored to- 
 health in answer to her prayers; and either through 
 the national reverence for one endowed with super- 
 natural powers or through sheer gratitude, they restored 
 her unharmed to her friends 2 . 
 
 The history of the barbarian inroads is bound up 
 with the story of one great man. Boniface, Count of 
 Africa, had passed nearly the whole of his official life 
 in Africa and had gained his great position by his 
 valour and skill. A friend of the Church, he had won 
 the praise of St Augustine by finding time in the 
 midst of his military duties to inquire concerning the 
 character and origin of Donatism 3 . In an age of the 
 utmost corruption, he was noted for his honesty ; no 
 bribe could move him, and he administered a rough 
 but efficient justice. As a frontier officer he was un- 
 rivalled ; with a few " foederati " he kept his district 
 secure and he fearlessly attacked the Moors wherever 
 he met them whether his forces were many or few, and 
 even when he was alone 4 - In fact for many years 
 under his rule the Province was kept clear of barbarian 
 foes. 
 
 On the death of his wife Boniface seriously medi- 
 
 1 Ep. 109, § 7. 2 Aug., Ep. 111. » Aug., Ep. 185. 
 
 4 Olympiodorus, frag. 42, F. H. G. p. 67. 
 
THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE AFRICAN CHURCH. 73 
 
 tated resigning his military command and retiring for 
 the remainder of his days into the holy calm of a 
 monastery; but St Augustine, whom he consulted, 
 disapproved of the scheme and persuaded him that his 
 duty to his country demanded that he should continue 
 to carry out the work he had so well begun. In 422, 
 he was made Count of Africa, and granted the rank 
 of 'Vir Spectabilis.' Whether these new honours 
 turned his head, or the new family ties which he now 
 formed by his second marriage with an Arian wife 
 disturbed his balance, is uncertain, but from this time 
 forward his whole life underwent a great change. Led 
 astray by his new wife, the friend of St Augustine even 
 allowed his daughter by this second marriage to receive 
 heretical baptism. Moreover there were dark reports 
 abroad that, throwing all continence aside, he had been 
 guilty of the grossest immorality. 
 
 Such a falling away as this had its usual effects, 
 and not only Boniface but all Africa suffered for his 
 crimes. His lapse from loyalty has already been 
 noticed, and now a strange sloth possessed him. His 
 old vigour and courage were no more ; he, who as a 
 tribune could drive back the Moors, could as a count 
 do nothing to save the Province ; on every side the 
 barbarian hordes ravaged as they pleased, and the once 
 great leader busy with loose living took no steps to 
 ward off disaster 1 . 
 
 It is perhaps unfair to put all the blame for the 
 disorganization of the Province upon the shoulders of 
 Boniface. No doubt he was very slack in the perform- 
 
 1 Aug., Ep. 220. 
 
74 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 ance of his duties and could have done much more to 
 defend his charge if he had continued in his old life 
 of virtue ; but at the same time the advance of the 
 Moors was inevitable, and the military system of the 
 Empire was not well fitted for a stout resistance. The 
 climate of Africa is very unsuitable for Northern races 
 and sooner or later the vigour of Europeans is always 
 sapped and the strength enervated by its effect upon 
 them. It was therefore a mistake to post one legion 
 permanently in the Province, as the Legio Tertia 
 Augusta had been for centuries. If they became in- 
 efficient, the lowlands were left practically defenceless 
 to the mercy of the Moors; for neither the Foederati 
 nor the Limitanei, mere militia, could ever have been 
 very formidable, while the moribund state of the West- 
 ern Empire prevented any help from other regions 
 being sent to the distressed Africans. 
 
 Still, as has been said, these thirty years were a 
 time of prosperity for the Church. Though the Berbers 
 were ever advancing, the Church as an organization 
 was not affected, and if the frontiers were disturbed 
 the heart of the Province was not yet attacked. In 
 other ways the cause of the Catholics had distinctly 
 progressed. Donatism, its great rival, had suffered a 
 fall — as complete as it was sudden. Its property was 
 confiscated, its ministers exiled, and its supporters out- 
 lawed ; and the sect, that had seemed once about to 
 crush out the Catholics altogether, had been reduced to 
 the position of a small struggling remnant in the out- 
 lying districts of the less-civilized provinces. Against 
 other dangers the Church had held its own. Pelagian- 
 ism had lost what footing it had in Africa, and the 
 
THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE AFRICAN CHURCH. 75 
 
 subtle Manichaeism had been forced to hide itself from 
 the eye of all authority. 
 
 The Church might therefore look back with satis- 
 faction on thirty years of advance since the fall of 
 Gildo. Mercifully, perhaps, her great leaders were not 
 allowed to foresee the fierce persecution with which it 
 was to meet at the hands of a new and terrible foe. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 The Rise of the Vandals. 
 
 The thirty years of peace through which the Church 
 had just passed were in 428 brought to an abrupt close 
 by the outbreak of a tremendous storm. Just as the 
 triumphs of St Augustine seemed to have won for the 
 Catholics the undisputed mastery of the Province, and 
 to have secured a long and useful career for the 
 triumphant Church, the sudden appearance of an un- 
 expected danger reduced her once more to the position 
 of a proscribed and persecuted society. In 428, the 
 Vandals crossed from Spain and held Africa for more 
 than a hundred years. To them, both as Arians, and 
 as enemies of Rome, the Church was doubly obnoxious, 
 and they treated her with as much harshness as their 
 political circumstances and the smallness of their 
 numbers permitted. Hardly at any time tolerated, she 
 was at certain periods and in certain places subjected 
 to the most barbarous persecution. 
 
 The exact cause which brought about the invasion 
 of Africa need concern the ecclesiastical historian but 
 little. He may believe what Procopius says of the 
 treacherous fraud of Aetius and the short-sighted folly 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 77 
 
 of Boniface 1 , or he may with the modern critic say 
 that the Count of Africa added treachery to his other 
 crimes, and, moved by a petty feeling of jealousy, 
 deliberately invited the enemies of his country and his 
 faith to share with him the province entrusted to his 
 care 2 . However this may be, in 428 s the Vandals and 
 Alans crossed the Straits of Gibraltar with the evident 
 intention of conquering Africa. Their leader Gaiseric 
 was peculiarly fitted for the task before them. He 
 was a brave warrior and astute statesman, and was 
 fully aware that a strong hand was needed to maintain 
 his authority amongst the Vandals. Though of di- 
 minutive stature and lame, owing to a fall from his 
 horse, he was terrible in anger and proof against 
 every fatigue. He loved war for its own sake, and 
 to the end of his life kept the shores of the Medi- 
 terranean in dread of his piratical expeditions. Great 
 statesman as he proved himself, he affected reckless- 
 ness enough when embarked on a marauding ex- 
 pedition. If his sailors asked him at the beginning 
 of one of these cruises in what direction they were to 
 steer, he would order them to sail before the wind 
 against those "with whom God was angry." Yet in 
 his administration and diplomacy Gaiseric shewed that 
 he could employ the utmost vigilance and caution. 
 Though an apostate from Catholicism, he tempered 
 the hatred of the renegade with the wisdom of the 
 
 1 Prooopius, De Bello Vandalico, i. 3. 
 
 2 Freeman, Eng. Hist. Rev., July, 1887. 
 
 3 I have adopted in the main the chronology of Mr Hodgkin for 
 this period. The authorities on which it is founded are cited in a 
 masterly note in Volume n. of his " Italy and her Invaders." 
 
78 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 statesman. Though a barbarian conqueror, he was 
 willing to keep the best part of Roman civilization. 
 Silent and watchful, he was ready to seize every ad- 
 vantage that diplomacy offered, and was practised in 
 sowing the seeds of enmity amongst his opponents 1 . 
 
 Under such a leader any foe would have been 
 dangerous; the Vandals were almost irresistible. A tall, 
 fair people, sprung from a race which had defeated 
 the best legionaries of the youthful Empire, the 
 degenerate colonists of the provinces were no match 
 for them. Salvian may have exaggerated the luxury 
 and vice of the provincials and the stern simplicity 
 of the barbarians, but it is impossible entirely to reject 
 his testimony that the collapse of the Roman power 
 was due to the superior discipline and morality of the 
 invaders 2 . 
 
 The geographical features and political organiza- 
 tion of the Province were in favour of the Vandals. 
 The part of Africa where they landed was the place 
 best fitted strategically for an invading host. Mauri- 
 tania Tingitana was never closely connected with the 
 rest of the Province, and in later times it was found 
 more convenient to administer it from Spain than 
 Carthage. The barren mountain ranges prevented the 
 formation of roads, and communications between Gades 
 and Numidia were only possible by sea. But the very 
 desolation and inaccessibility of the region fitted it for 
 
 1 For Gaiserio's character see Procop., De Bell. Vand., i. 3; 
 Jordanes, De Mebus Geticis, c. 33; Iaidor. Hispal., Hist. Vand., c. 74. 
 
 2 Salvian, De Gubernatione Dei, v. 14, vii. 27 — 9, 65, etc. He 
 speaks of the Vandals as "ignavissimi," which seems at least an 
 exaggeration. 
 
THE KISE OF THE VANDALS. 79 
 
 the purposes of the Vandals, who needed at first no 
 permanent home, but a base of operations, where 
 they could safely leave their wives and children while 
 they themselves overran the more fertile plains. From 
 the Moorish tribes there was little to fear. Their one 
 idea was hatred of the Roman provincial and love of 
 his goods, and it must have been easy for a skilled 
 diplomatist like Gaiseric to gain their friendship by the 
 promise of the plunder of the rich eastern lowlands. 
 
 The complicated machinery of the provincial govern- 
 ment prevented a prompt attack of the invaders. Ac- 
 cording to the regular system of the Empire, all power 
 should have been vested in the Vicarius Africae under 
 the supervision of the Praetorian Prefect; but by a 
 curious exception his authority was limited to the 
 Mauritania, Numidia, Byzacene and Tripoli, while Zeugi- 
 tana, the most important district of all and the centre 
 of the whole Province, was under the separate rule of 
 the Proconsul of Africa. Both these officials lived at 
 Carthage, and as their authority continually clashed 
 considerable jealousy and ill-feeling existed between 
 them. To make confusion worse confounded, only the 
 civil power was under this dual control ; the direction 
 of military affairs throughout Africa was vested in the 
 Comes Africae, who took no orders except from the 
 Praetorian Prefect of Italy 1 . With such a medley of 
 authorities it would have been very wonderful if the 
 defence of the Province had been well directed, and it 
 may be supposed that the discords of the great Roman 
 officials had much to do with the rapid fall of the 
 Imperial power. 
 
 1 Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders, Vol. n. p. 242. 
 
80 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 For the Vandals became masters of Africa within a 
 very short time. Landing in A.D. 428, they were practi- 
 cally supreme throughout the Province by the fall of 
 Carthage in 439. After this the war passed out of 
 its acute stage and merely lingered on. In 442 a 
 final peace was made and a partition of territory with 
 Valentinian III. agreed upon, despite which the Vandals 
 continued to increase their dominions until the capture 
 of Home in 455 gave them the opportunity of reaching 
 their furthest limits by the gradual occupation of 
 Tripoli. 
 
 Within two years of the landing of the Vandals it 
 is said that only three Churches were still in existence. 
 Of these, the fate of Cirta is unknown; Hippo fell 
 after a brave defence, and Carthage was captured by 
 treachery 1 . Although Boniface soon discovered his 
 mistake and tried with all his old courage to repair 
 his errors, the invaders made rapid progress. In May, 
 430, Hippo was besieged, and St Augustine and 
 many other bishops were shut up within its walls. 
 Boniface himself conducted the defence with the Gothic 
 " foederati," and for fourteen months fought so bravely 
 that the Vandals marched away in despair. But long 
 before the retreat of the foe the great Bishop of Hippo 
 had passed to his rest. He was stricken with fever 
 three months after the beginning of the siege, and on 
 the 28th of August, 430, the Church, not only of Africa 
 but of the whole world, suffered an irreparable loss by 
 the death of the venerable prelate at the age of seventy- 
 five 2 . It was well perhaps that the champion of ortho- 
 
 1 Possidius, Vita Sti. Aug. Ep., cc. 28—30. 
 
 2 Victor Vit., I. 3. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 81 
 
 doxy should not live to see the Church, which he had 
 so manfully defended against schisms and heresies, at 
 length subverted, as it seemed for ever, by a barbarian 
 and heretical foe. We may hope that his last moments 
 were cheered by a reconciliation with the brave soldier 
 who had so sadly belied the hopes raised by his earlier 
 career. 
 
 For a time the Vandals were checked, but their 
 
 period of inactivity was brief. Boniface, encouraged by 
 
 reinforcements from Rome and by the arrival of Aspar 
 
 with help from the Eastern Empire, took the field, but 
 
 was completely routed at the first encounter 1 - From this 
 
 time the fate of Africa was sealed. Hippo was deserted 
 
 by its inhabitants and burned by the Vandals, and 
 
 the Romans were forced to make a truce with their 
 
 successful foes. In 435 a peace was concluded between 
 
 Gaiseric and Trigetius at Hippo. The conditions are 
 
 not fully recorded, but it seems to have been stipulated 
 
 that the Emperor should grant to the invaders a portion 
 
 of Africa, in return for which the Vandals should pay 
 
 tribute and give up Hunneric, the eldest son of their 
 
 king, as a hostage for their good behaviour. Possibly 
 
 the district thus given up consisted of the three 
 
 Mauritanias, but of this there is no certainty. It is 
 
 also likely that the barbarians undertook not to attack 
 
 Carthage ; for the unexpected capture of this city caused 
 
 the greatest indignation amongst the other inhabitants 
 
 of the Empire 2 . 
 
 1 Procopius, De Bella Vand., i. 4. 
 
 2 For this treaty vide Procop., De Bell. Vand., i. 4 ; Prosper, s.a., 
 439; Prosper Tyro, Canisii Ant. Lecti, s.a. 435 ; Camiodnus, s.a. 12, 
 Theodosius. 
 
 H. 6 
 
82 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 For the next few years the Africans were permitted 
 by the policy of a conqueror the enjoyment of a period 
 of cessation of active hostilities. Soon, however, the 
 court of Ravenna seems to have been sufficiently 
 misguided to allow Gaiseric's son, Hunneric, to return 
 home. A rude awakening soon came 1 . On October 
 19th, 439, while the attention of Aetius was taken up 
 with the affairs of Gaul, Gaiseric appeared before the 
 walls of Carthage, and obtaining admission on the 
 pretext of peace treacherously seized the city. War 
 at once broke out again and lasted for three years. 
 Now, however, the Romans had no chance of success, 
 and there is no record of any fighting in Africa. 
 The Vandals on the contrary began their career as the 
 scourges of the Mediterranean by a descent on Sicily. In 
 440, Gaiseric invaded and ravaged the islands far and 
 wide until recalled by the news of the arrival of Count 
 Sebastian in Africa 2 . He however turned out to be a 
 fugitive from Rome and not a Roman general. In 441, 
 Theodosius II. sent from Constantinople a great arma- 
 ment of 1100 vessels under Areobindus, Anaxilla, 
 Germanus and other leaders 3 ; but this too ended in 
 failure, and was the cause of more harm to Sicily than 
 to Africa, its only result being that an embassy was 
 sent by Gaiseric to the Eastern Emperor. This was 
 the last attempt to drive out the Vandals. In the 
 following year Valentinian was forced to agree to one 
 
 1 Prosper, s.a. 443; Prosper Tyro, s.a. 445 (ed. Canis.), s.a. 439; 
 Marcellinus Comes gives the date as 23 Oct. 439. 
 
 2 Prosper, s.a. 444; Prosper Tyro (ed. Canis.), s.a. 440; Idatius, 
 s.a. 26th of Theodosius II. 
 
 3 Theorphanes, s.a. 441 ; Prosper, s.a. 445 ; Prosper Tyro, s.a. 441. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 83 
 
 more province being torn from his crumbling Empire, 
 and to sign a definite peace with Gaiseric. 
 
 Africa was divided according to "certain limits," 
 and perhaps even Sicily was surrendered. Koughly 
 speaking, the Vandals acquired Byzacene, Proconsularis 
 and Numidia ; the Empire kept the three Mauritanias 
 and Tripoli 1 . That is to say, the invaders obtained all 
 the fertile parts of the province ; the Romans retaining 
 only the thinly populated districts which on the death 
 of Valentinian III. (in a.d. 455) were lost to the 
 Empire 3 . Unfortunately for Africa neither side was 
 equal to the task of obtaining the mastery. The 
 Vandals were not sufficiently numerous to hold their 
 territories effectually; the Empire was too weak to 
 reconquer them. From this time therefore the Moors 
 began to gain ground and to establish themselves in a 
 position from which it proved impossible to dislodge 
 them. 
 
 Thus then was Africa conquered by the Vandals. 
 Putting aside their superiority in homogeneity, physique, 
 morality and recklessness, it is worth while to consider 
 
 1 Prosper, s.a. 446 ; Prosper Tyro, Canis. Ant. Led., s.a. 442 ; 
 Cassiodorus, s.a. 19 Theodos. ; Victor Vit., i. 4. 
 
 2 Mauritania must in name at least have been kept by Valentinian. 
 The Novels 23 (22 June, 445) and 37 Valentin, and Theodos. (13 July, 
 451) apply to it. It was probably never colonized by the Vandals. 
 The epitaph of Novatus (G. I. L., 8634) in the year 440 points to the 
 establishment of comparative quiet then. Dr Hodgkin places the 
 division of the province recorded by Victor Vitensis (i. 4) in 435. I 
 prefer to follow Papencordt in assigning it to the final peace of 442 ; 
 Victor mentions it after the Fall of Carthage in 439, and this surely 
 proves that it could not have been arranged in 435. Marcus (Histoire 
 des Wandales, iii. 1) and Tissot (n. ii. 1, § 7) make an additional 
 truce in 432, but on no convincing evidence. 
 
 6—2 
 
84 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 how far they were aided by disaffection within the 
 province itself. Neither Moors nor Donatists had much 
 cause to love the Roman rigime, and there is no prima 
 facie improbability in assuming that they threw in their 
 lot with Gaiseric. Of these two possible allies, the part 
 played by the latter is the more uncertain and has caused 
 much difference of opinion amongst modern historians '. 
 From the time of St Augustine to the reign of Pope 
 Gregory II. nothing is known of them, and at first 
 sight it appears unlikely that a sect which had re- 
 pudiated Arianism* would side with the heretical 
 Vandals. But the times were now altered and the 
 Donatists of 428 were not the Donatists of 398. The 
 wise policy of St Augustine, supported by the per- 
 secuting policy of the Roman government, had nearly 
 destroyed the schismatical party. All the more re- 
 spectable, all the enlightened and reasonable members 
 of the sect had by this time rejoined the Catholic 
 Church. The Circumcelliones alone remained obdu- 
 rate, and it is easy to suppose that with them theo- 
 logical scruples were easily overcome by fanatical hate. 
 Indeed as early as 417, the more violent Donatists had 
 negociated with the Goths and professed themselves 
 Arians for political reasons, though they were dis- 
 owned by their more respectable brethren ; and now, 
 driven to despair by harsh treatment and with all their 
 social grievances unredressed, they probably found no 
 difficulty in once more proving complaisant and in 
 sacrificing their creed for the sake of their revenge, 
 
 1 Papencordt (pp. 284, 6) argues that they did not help the Vandals ; 
 Gibbon (chap, xiii.), Marcus (iii. 1), and Fournel (i. 2), maintain that 
 they did. 2 Aug., Ep. 185, § 1. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 85 
 
 No contemporary historian, it is true, says that the 
 Vandals were aided by the schismatics ; on the other 
 hand we have no remarks on either the persecution or 
 the immunity of the Donatists. Probably they had by 
 this time dropped out of sight, and though the few 
 surviving Circumcelliones helped Gaiseric, they were 
 confounded with the Moors, to whom they were so 
 closely allied. 
 
 For there is little doubt that the barbarian tribes 
 sided with the invaders. They had from the first 
 hated the Romans, and the events of the last fifty 
 years had made them despise them. They loved 
 plunder for its own sake and were ever on the watch 
 for opportunities to ravage the province. The appear- 
 ance of the Vandals gave them a splendid chance, and 
 they were far too valuable as allies to be overlooked 
 by a skilled diplomatist like Gaiseric. A few years 
 later Moorish contingents formed part of the piratical 
 crews which ravaged the Mediterranean 1 , and in all 
 probability the presence of Berber and Vandal in the 
 same army dates from the beginning of the conquest 
 of Africa. 
 
 The ten years' war and the triumph of barbarism 
 over civilization wrought havoc among the Roman 
 settlements 2 . On all sides the advance of the invaders 
 was marked by burning houses, ruined farms and 
 reckless devastation. When Carthage fell, the senseless 
 rage of the conquerors was turned against the mag- 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 8. 
 
 2 The authorities for the ravages of the Vandals are: — Victor 
 VitensiB, i. 1—4 ; Possidius, Vita S. Augusti, c. 28 ; Proeopius, De 
 Bello Vandalico, i. 3 — i. 
 
86 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 nificent public buildings, and the peculiar hatred of 
 the beautiful, which has given to the Vandals their 
 evil reputation, now especially found vent. The Odeon, 
 the theatre, and the temple of Memory perished utterly, 
 nor did the Via Caelestis with its magnificent pavement 
 and its carven pillars escape the hands of the destroyers 1 . 
 
 The invaders knew no mercy, as long as the con- 
 quest was incomplete, and neither age nor sex protected 
 the miserable provincials from their enemies. The very 
 babes were snatched from their mothers' arms and 
 hurled to the ground, and the only safety was in flight. 
 The country districts were almost depopulated, and the 
 wretched inhabitants hid in the caves and chasms of 
 the mountains, only in many cases to meet a lingering 
 death by hunger and thirst. When Carthage was taken, 
 the fury of the Vandals had somewhat spent itself and 
 less barbarity was shewn. There were not so many 
 massacres, and the invaders sought rather to enrich 
 themselves than to slay the citizens. To this end large 
 numbers of the senators were imprisoned and tortured 
 and compelled to give up all their gold, silver and 
 precious stones. Many others, amongst whom were the 
 grandparents of Bishop Fulgentius of Ruspe 2 , fled, and 
 if they left their property behind them, no obstacles 
 seem to have been put in their way. 
 
 But the Vandals were more than mere barbarians, 
 filled with insensate rage against the noblest works of 
 civilization ; Arians as they were, they were firmly at- 
 tached to Christianity and deeply imbued with that stern 
 military puritanism which so often appears in the Teu- 
 
 1 See Prosper, De Promissionibus, ii. 38, for a description of the Via. 
 
 2 Vita S. Fulgentii, c. 1. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 87 
 
 tonic race. Perhaps even the destruction of the splendid 
 buildings of Carthage was caused by their real or fancied 
 connection with old pagan gods. At any rate the Catholic 
 clergy provoked the worst feelings in the minds of the 
 Arian invaders, who, regarding the vices of the orthodox 
 provincials with loathing, especially marked them out 
 for insult and massacre. They were believed to be 
 the possessors of vast stores of concealed wealth, and 
 fearful tortures were used to cause them to reveal it. 
 Their mouths were held open with sticks and filled 
 with loathsome filth; vile compounds of salt water, 
 vinegar and the lees of wine were forced down their 
 throats ; cords twisted round their foreheads and legs 
 cut into their flesh ; and some, loaded with baggage 
 like camels, were goaded on until they fell dead with 
 exhaustion. If overcome by their miseries, they did 
 give up their possessions, they were tormented afresh 
 to make them produce their hidden stores. Vast 
 numbers were thus tortured, and Panpinian, a priest, 
 and Mansuetus, Bishop of Urci, were burned to death. 
 In all directions the clergy were driven out or slain ; 
 religious communities were broken up and many of 
 the devout women were exposed to the grossest out- 
 rage and infamy. When the Vandals had done their 
 worst to the Catholic clergy, they turned their at- 
 tention to the churches. Every building set apart 
 for the orthodox worship, the monasteries and burying 
 places, were ravaged and laid waste without respect 
 to their sacred character. Sacramental vessels and 
 ecclesiastical vestments were taken and destroyed ; the 
 churches were set on fire, and if their strength defied 
 the hosts of the despoilers, the doors were broken open, 
 
88 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 the roofs were stripped off, the walls were defaced and 
 only a desolate ruin was left. In Carthage the Arians 
 took possession of the Church property, and either 
 devoted it to their own worship or turned it into 
 dwelling-houses for their priests'. 
 
 In fact for a time the Catholics were entirely dis- 
 organized. In the first throes of their distress the 
 clergy appealed to St Augustine through Bishop Hono- 
 ratus to know whether they would be justified in leaving 
 their flocks and flying to places of greater security. 
 The great bishop replied that they must not shrink 
 from any personal danger ; if all were in peril, let 
 clergy and laity flee together ; but if the clergy alone 
 were threatened, they must not desert their posts to 
 seek their own safety 2 . But with all her devotion it 
 was impossible for the Church to maintain her efficiency. 
 In 431 Capreolus bad to refuse an invitation to send 
 delegates to the Third General Council at Ephesus, 
 on the ground that the terrible devastations of the 
 Vandals and their pressure on every side made it im- 
 practicable to summon a general synod in Africa ". 
 
 Such is the picture drawn by the historians of the 
 ravages of the Vandal invaders. But it is not clear 
 that some of the colours are not unduly heightened 
 by religious and national resentment. No Vandal 
 writer ever arose to give a second account of the war, 
 and there is much in the statements of Victor and 
 Possidius to shew the need of caution in accepting their 
 facts as literally true. 
 
 1 Isodorus, Hispalensis, Hist. Vand., c. 75 ; Prosper, s.a. 443. 
 
 2 Possidius, Vita S. Augusti., c. 28. 
 
 3 Ruinart, Hist. Persecu. Vand., iii. 2. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 89 
 
 Though Victor asserts that the number of the clergy 
 who were tortured was too great to be told, he mentions 
 only two by name. Fuller particulars of the massacres 
 related would be more convincing than vague denunci- 
 ations; and besides, two or three statements of the 
 same writer are almost incredible. In the first place 
 he declares that the Vandals uprooted all the fruit-trees 
 in order to prevent the fugitives obtaining food from 
 them 1 . Now Gaiseric, as a statesman, who had come 
 to Africa to provide a home for his people, cannot be 
 believed to have allowed one of the chief sources of 
 the wealth of the province to be destroyed in order to 
 gratify a momentary passion. Probably at the first 
 onset he sanctioned extensive ravages from motives 
 oi policy and with the idea of striking terror into the 
 hearts of the Liby-Phoenician inhabitants. But when 
 the marvellous remains of the Roman power are con- 
 sidered, and the rapid enervation of the Vandals through 
 unaccustomed luxuries is remembered, it seems evident 
 that the amount of devastation has been greatly ex- 
 aggerated. 
 
 It is further asserted that the invaders were in 
 the habit of hastening the surrender of well-defended 
 towns, by slaying the prisoners and piling their 
 putrefying bodies against the walls to cause disease 
 amongst the garrison 2 . If resort was ever had to this 
 device, its ingenuity was certainly admirable ; but it is 
 difficult to understand how it did not recoil upon its 
 authors and involve besieged and besiegers alike in 
 one dread infection. Perhaps, however, this statement 
 may be due to Victor's uncritical mind, for if the 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 1. ° Victor Vit., i. 3. 
 
90 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 bodies of the slain around the town caused pestilence, 
 it does not follow that the Vandals deliberately neg- 
 lected all sanitary precautions out of a fiendish policy 
 of spreading disease. 
 
 But there is a curious anti-climax in Victor's 
 complaints. After narrating the terrible devastation 
 of the country, the wrecking of the churches, the 
 massacre of the population and the tortures of the 
 clergy, after telling of the fall of Carthage, the exile 
 of its bishop and the confiscation of the basilicas, he 
 asks how anyone can endure to relate without tears 
 that the Catholics were forced to carry their dear ones 
 in silence to the grave without the consolation of 
 hymns 1 . From this it certainly seems probable that 
 after the capture of Carthage at any rate the active 
 persecution of the Church was not great. 
 
 The settlement of Africa by the Vandals confirms 
 the impression — our facts justify nothing more — that 
 the barbarity of the invaders has been painted in too 
 glaring a hue. There was of course much individual 
 hardship and much confiscation of property, but if 
 the half-civilized state of the conquerors and the 
 nature of the work they had to do are considered, it 
 is evident that their measures were most politic and 
 not unduly harsh. Gaiseric aimed at establishing his 
 people in their new home, at securing them against 
 domestic risings and assuring their enjoyment of all 
 that was best of the land's produce. He did not wish 
 to oppress the old inhabitants unnecessarily, and, once 
 the settlement was complete, both in religious and 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 5. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 91 
 
 secular matters only prominent opponents suffered at 
 his hands. 
 
 There was no attempt at depopulation. Indeed the 
 numbers of the Vandals prevented any such scheme. 
 Never a numerous people, when the conquest was over, 
 they mustered barely fifty thousand able-bodied soldiers. 
 When they landed they had only eighty thousand males, 
 and this included not only the Alani but old men, infants 
 and slaves 1 ; nor did theyreacheven this nominal strength 
 of eighty chiliarchies until they had intermarried with 
 the Moors 2 . The utmost Gaiseric could hope to do was 
 to make his people the dominant race in Africa, and 
 in order to effect this the Berbers' encroachments had 
 to be restrained and the old inhabitants held in sub- 
 jection. As long as the great conqueror lived the first 
 difficulty was easily met ; the border tribes were forced 
 or cajoled into alliance and it was only under his suc- 
 cessors that the raids of the Moors gave any trouble. 
 
 The second danger* was the greater. For the con- 
 quered race were indispensable to their conquerors. 
 They tilled the soil and paid the taxes ; they introduced 
 their masters to comforts as yet unknown to them - T 
 their habits of business made them even necessary 
 for the carrying on of the administration. 
 
 The Vandals seemed to conquer Africa ; Africa 
 really conquered the Vandals, and the history of the 
 invaders during the next hundred years is the story 
 of their gradual assimilation by those whom they had 
 defeated. For not even Rome could surpass the de- 
 lights of Carthage, and the seductive luxuries of the 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 1. ' Procop., De Bello Vand., i. 5. 
 
92 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 hot climate of Africa combined to overcome the stern 
 simplicity of the northern barbarians. But for every 
 luxury, which under the burning rays of the Libyan 
 sun became a necessity of life, the Vandals were 
 dependent upon the despised provincials, and had 
 therefore to treat them with moderation and con- 
 siderateness. 
 
 In the matter of government also the Africans had 
 much to teach the Vandals. They had for centuries 
 lived under the highly elaborated system of the Empire, 
 which, with all its faults, was the best the world had 
 yet experienced. The Vandals on the other hand had 
 nothing more than the rude tribal organization common 
 to all Teutonic peoples. Gaiseric, too able a statesman 
 to destroy an instrument he could not replace, decided 
 to continue the local administration on the lines laid 
 down by Roman experience. To do this he needed 
 trained officials, and his own warriors were quite un- 
 able to take the place of the Imperial staff. He was 
 forced to employ the old officials, and had to trust to 
 the aid of provincials to oppress their unfortunate fellow- 
 countrymen. Many of the victims of Arian oppression 
 were men occupying high positions in the civil service 1 , 
 and the decree of Hunneric against the Catholics keeps 
 exactly the same list of officials and rank as it had when 
 it was first drawn up a century before by Theodosius 2 . 
 
 Still though the Vandals did not try to exterminate 
 the old population, they provided themselves with 
 estates from the conquered territories. A division of 
 the provinces between the king and his followers 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 14—18, etc. 
 
 2 Compare Victor Vit., v. 12, and Theodos., Cod., xvi. v. 48. 
 
THE BISE OF THE VANDALS. 93 
 
 formed the basis of the settlement 1 . The greater part 
 of Zeugitana, a small but very productive district round 
 Carthage, known henceforth as the " Sortes Vanda- 
 lorum," was granted to the two sons of Gaiseric and to 
 the Vandals. Byzacene, Abaritana and Getulia, kept 
 by the king as the royal demesne, were still inhabited 
 by the old population. As the conquerors were un- 
 able to occupy all the lands, only the best estates 
 were actually seized by them ; but the former owners 
 of these received no compensation and were reduced 
 to the utmost poverty. Still they were not enslaved, 
 but were free to depart to any place they wished, 
 and were perhaps not much worse off than those 
 who still kept their estates in the Sortes Vanda- 
 lorum. For as the lands of the king and the Vandals 
 paid no taxes, the whole expenses of government fell 
 upon the old inhabitants. Nearly all the produce of 
 the poorer farms was seized by the conquerors, and, as 
 the wretched cultivators had barely enough to keep 
 body and soul together, many of them fled in despair 
 of making a living, and others were arrested on the 
 charge of concealing wealth and put to death. After 
 a time these exactions became less, and at length 
 the whole land-tax fell into abeyance, for when Africa 
 had been reconquered and an attempt was made to 
 impose the old dues on the land, all record of the 
 former assessment had disappeared, and great dis- 
 satisfaction was felt at what was thought a novel and 
 tyrannical exaction 2 . 
 
 1 For account of this settlement, cf. Procopius, De Bell. Vand., i. 5, 
 and Victor Vit., i. 5. 
 
 2 Procop., De Bello Vand., ii. 8. 
 
94 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 The greatest crime in the eyes of the Vandals 
 was the ownership, especially the secret ownership, of 
 portable wealth. When the first settlement was made 
 the country magnates had been especially singled out 
 for oppression, and if anyone was conspicuous for wealth 
 or good birth he was at once enslaved and given to 
 Hunneric and Genzo, the two surviving sons of Gaiseric. 
 No doubt the precariousness of the position of the 
 Vandals dictated this policy. Surrounded as they 
 were by an alien population, dreading fresh attempts 
 at reconquest, and by no means entirely united amongst 
 themselves 1 , it was all important for them to secure 
 against internal risings the great danger of a conquer- 
 ing race. The disaffected of their own race it was easy 
 to crush ; to check the muttering discontent of the old 
 inhabitants was a far more difficult task. The simplest 
 and most effectual means was to deprive the Africans 
 of their natural leaders. As long as those remained 
 who had the means, or were qualified to head a rising, 
 the Vandals could never be secure, and every expedition 
 of the Eastern or Western Emperors was ten times more 
 dangerous. But when once the important men had been 
 exiled or enslaved, the fear of domestic insurrection well- 
 nigh passed away. 
 
 Gaiseric was, however, led by this feeling of in- 
 security to measures of more doubtful policy. In his 
 anxiety to deprive any rebels of a base of operations 
 he forgot the dominating feature of the political 
 situation of the province. He overlooked the ever- 
 threatening attitude of the Moors, and, trusting too 
 
 1 Prosper, s.a., 446; Prosper Tyro, s.a., 442. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 95 
 
 much in his own powers of keeping them quiet, 
 destroyed the walls of all the towns, even of those on 
 the border. The defences of Carthage alone were 
 spared, and the rest of the province was left at the 
 mercy of any attacking force. As long as Gaiseric 
 lived little harm came of this policy ; but in the days 
 of his weaker successors, and even after the restoration 
 of the Koman power, the borders were harried by 
 the Moors at their own pleasure, and the miserable 
 inhabitants of the province had to trust to barricades 
 from house to house and such crazy defences as they 
 had the means to throw up 1 . 
 
 Although the Africans were greatly oppressed for 
 the first few years of the Vandal occupation, it seems 
 that as soon as the new-comers felt themselves secure, 
 their lot was considerably ameliorated, and perhaps did 
 not compare unfavourably with the position of the lower 
 classes within the Soman Empire. No doubt the 
 taxation of the lands unappropriated by the Vandals 
 was very heavy ; but it can hardly have been heavier 
 than that imposed by the imperial government 2 , and 
 the discontent aroused by Justinian's demands seems 
 to shew that as time went on it was remitted 3 . More- 
 over Gaiseric allowed no one to plunder the old 
 inhabitants but himself. The grandparents of St 
 Fulgentius had fled from Africa during the invasion 
 and abandoned all their property. On their death 
 their two sons decided to return and try to regain 
 their patrimony. Their house at Carthage had been 
 
 1 Procop., Be Bell. Vandal., i. 5 ; Be Mdificiis, vi. §§ 5, 6. 
 
 2 Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders, ii. 264. 
 
 3 Procop., Be Bell. Vand., ii. 8. 
 
96 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 assigned to the Arian priests and was of course irre- 
 coverable, but their estates in Byzacene were success- 
 fully claimed through the authority of the king himself 1 . 
 There could not have been much serious oppression at 
 this time if two fugitives were willing and able to 
 return, and the whole incident bespeaks an orderly and 
 comparatively just government. The stories of the 
 martyrs point to the same conclusion. Saturus, the 
 procurator of the household of Hunneric, was a man 
 of considerable wealth 2 , and the master of Marcella, 
 Martinianus and Saturianus evidently valued them 
 and tried to make them contented 8 . There was no 
 hindrance placed upon free communication, and St 
 Fulgentius was able to found monasteries with far 
 more security than might have been expected in a 
 bitterly Arian state. In fact under the Vandal rule 
 the position of the African peasantry was not exception- 
 ally hard. 
 
 One great reform was left to the shame of the 
 Catholics to the heretical conquerors to carry out. It 
 has been said that Carthage was the most immoral 
 of cities; prostitution and still viler vices were rife, 
 and some of the clergy even were contaminated. 
 Against all this the Vandals, at any rate at the com- 
 mencement of their rule, set their faces. The brothels 
 were closed ; the courtesans were forced to marry ; the 
 catamites were expelled, and the strictest laws were 
 made against all immorality 4 . Unfortunately in the 
 end the northern invaders relaxed their severe code. 
 
 1 Vita, Sti. Fulgent. § 1. 2 victor Vit., i. 16. 
 
 3 Victor Vit, i. 11. 
 
 4 Sarvian, De Gubernatione Dei, viii. 85 — 100. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 97 
 
 They could not preserve their purity in the hot climate 
 of Africa, and soon became the slaves of every form 
 of luxury and vice. 
 
 Gaiseric however found that his work did not end 
 with the subjection of the Roman inhabitants. He 
 was at the head of a warrior race, flushed with success 
 and demoralized by fifteen years of pillage and rapine, 
 and he experienced the difficulties of all leaders of 
 conquering hordes. As long as his followers were 
 employed they were easy to rule, as soon as their 
 success was assured discontent broke out amongst 
 them. Probably Gaiseric undertook his piratical voy- 
 ages as much to secure his own throne as to harass 
 the Empire. On the other hand, the Vandal nobility 
 felt that the increased authority 1 assumed by the king, 
 if necessary in war, was intolerable in peace ; and now 
 that they were the undisputed masters of Africa and 
 the time had come to lay aside their swords and settle 
 quietly down, they remembered that there were ugly 
 tales about the manner of his accession. In 442 their 
 discontent nearly came to a head and the miserable 
 province was not far from the horrors of civil war. 
 The conspiracy was discovered and promptly put down. 
 With such ruthlessness were tortures and death meted 
 out to all suspected of plotting against the king, that 
 it was said that more died through this revolt than 
 would have perished in an unsuccessful war 2 . 
 
 Alarmed by this narrow escape, Gaiseric determined 
 to settle once for all the rule of the succession. In 
 
 1 About this time Gaiseric took the title of King, of.: — Theophanes, 
 s.a. 441. 
 
 2 Prosper Tyro, Dioscuro et Eudoxio Coss, s.a. 442. 
 
 H. 7 
 
98 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 his will he declared that in future the crown should 
 always belong to the eldest male of the royal stock 1 . 
 
 Into the rest of the secular history of Gaiseric's 
 reign there is no need to go at length. It was passed 
 on his part in predatory expeditions against the islands 
 of the Mediterranean, and on the part of the Emperors 
 of the East and West in fruitless expeditions to recover 
 the Roman province. Even before the conquest of 
 Africa was complete, the terrible galleys of the Vandals 
 sallied forth from Carthage and before many years 
 were over they became the undisputed masters of the 
 Mediterranean. In 440 Sicily was ravaged, Panormus 
 was besieged for some months, and the Catholics felt 
 the rage of the invaders 2 . No country was safe, and 
 Spain, Italy and Greece 3 in turn had cause to regret 
 the impotence of the Emperors. On the death of 
 Valentinian, the Vandals were strong enough to extend 
 their conquests, and Sardinia, Corsica, Sicily and the 
 Balearic Isles 4 fell into their hands. Sicily was how- 
 ever recovered by Marcellinus 6 in 463, only to be 
 exposed to fresh attacks until the final peace with 
 Zeno in 476 gave the Empire a brief respite 6 . 
 
 The supremacy of Gaiseric was however shewn by 
 a still greater exhibition of power. After the murder 
 of Valentinian III., the Empress Eudoxia, who had been 
 forced into a union with Maximus, the assassin of her 
 husband, saw no escape save in seeking help from 
 
 1 Jordanes, Be Rebus Geticis, c. 33; Prooop., Be Bello Vand. i. 7 
 
 2 Idatius, 15th year of Theodosius II. s Victor Vit., i. 17. 
 * Victor Vit. i. 4. 6 Idatius, 2nd year of Severus. 
 
 " Procop., Be Bello Vand. , i. 17. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 99 
 
 Carthage 1 . So in 455 the Vandal fleet appeared off 
 Ostia and found the city defenceless before them. In 
 hope of securing some sort of mercy Pope Leo the 
 Great advanced to meet them and besought them to 
 abstain from ravages. The best terms he could obtain 
 was that for fourteen days Rome should be given up to 
 plunder. The Empress, her two daughters, Eudocia 
 and Placidia, Gaudentius the son of Aetus and hundreds 
 of lesser prisoners were carried off. Gold, silver and 
 brass, "the riches of many kings," were seized; the 
 temple of Jupiter Capitolinus was destroyed to get 
 at its golden and brazen roof; and richly jewelled 
 chalices, ecclesiastical robes, the furniture of the 
 Imperial palace, the spoils of the Temple brought by 
 Titus from Jerusalem, became the prey of the Vandals. 
 On the return to Africa, one of the ships containing 
 the captured statues was lost, but the rest of the spoil 
 and the prisoners were divided amongst the Vandals 
 and their Moorish allies. The Empress Eudoxia and 
 her daughter Placidia were sent to Constantinople, 
 possibly ransomed by the Emperor Leo 2 ; but Eudocia 
 was married to Hunneric, Gaiseric's eldest son. With 
 him she passed sixteen years of married life and became 
 the mother of Hilderic; in 471, she fled to Jerusalem 
 and died there 3 . 
 
 Gaiseric however was not left to pursue his piracies 
 undisturbed; for both the Western and Eastern Em- 
 perors made futile attempts to remove the scourge 
 
 1 For account of Vandal capture of Eome, vide Prosper, s.a. 455 ; 
 Theophanes, s.a. 447 — 8 ; Victor Vit., i. 8 ; Procop., De Bello Vand., 
 i. 5. 
 
 2 Chron. Paschale, s.a. 445. J Theophanes, s.a. 464. 
 
 7-2 
 
100 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 of the Mediterranean. The abortive expedition of 
 Theodosius in 441 has already been mentioned. In 
 458 \ Majorian threatened an attack by the Straits of 
 Gibraltar and again Gaiseric entered into negotiations ; 
 but the boats, prepared for the expedition, were stolen 
 by the Vandals, so that the Emperor had effected 
 nothing before his death of dysentery. In 463, as has 
 been already stated, Marcellinus recovered Sicily for 
 the Western Empire, and the next few years saw 
 Gaiseric threatened by three other expeditions. In 
 467 and 469 2 , Anthemius is said to have prepared 
 to attack him ; but the political situation and the 
 difficulties of navigation foiled his first attempt, and 
 of the second expedition nothing is known, except its 
 conception and the appointment of Marcellinus and 
 Richimer as leaders. Far more dangerous was the 
 great armament despatched by Leo, the Emperor of 
 the West, in 468 s . It was commonly said that no 
 fewer than 100,000 men were sent under the command 
 of Basiliscus to reconquer Africa. At the same time 
 Marcellinus conquered Sardinia and Heraclius ravaged 
 Tripoli. Gaiseric, dismayed at the strength of the 
 enemy, felt that resistance was hopeless. However 
 where force failed, guile succeeded ; during a five days' 
 truce which the crafty barbarian had obtained from 
 Basiliscus, he sent fire-ships amongst the unguarded 
 fleet of the Romans. A sudden attack completed the 
 
 1 Isid., Hispal. Hist. Vandal., § 76 ; Idatius, 4th year of Majorian; 
 Prooop., Be Bella Vandal., i. 7. 
 
 2 Idatius, 2nd year of Severus ; 1st year of Anthemius ; 3rd year 
 of Anthemius. 
 
 3 Procop. , De Bello Vand., i. 6 ; Theophanes, s.a. 463. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 101 
 
 work of the flames and Leo's Armada was utterly 
 destroyed. 
 
 The failure of this enterprise brought quiet to the 
 Vandals. The Western Emperors were soon in no 
 position to harass them, and Odoacer, when he had 
 gained the mastery of Italy feeling little inclination 
 to attack a fellow barbarian, concluded a peace 1 
 with Gaiseric, by which all Sicily except a small 
 portion was ceded to him in return for a yearly 
 tribute. The Eastern Emperors found enough to do 
 near home and abandoned expeditions to Africa as too 
 costly and precarious. Gaiseric was left to resume his 
 ravages unchecked until in 476 he made a treaty with 
 Zeno 2 , and pledged himself to leave the Imperial 
 dominions unmolested on condition of undisturbed 
 possession of his conquests. This treaty was observed 
 on the part of the Romans until the days of Justinian. 
 
 The policy pursued by Gaiseric towards the Catholic 
 Church resembled in many ways his treatment of the 
 •old landowners. He neither tried to exterminate it, 
 nor did he persecute it with fanatical bigotry, and was 
 willing to leave it alone when he could. But he did 
 his best to depress it, to deprive it of its old authority, 
 and above all he permitted no proselytism amongst the 
 Vandals. Indeed he seems to have accepted it as a 
 factor of the situation, and to have realized that as long 
 as there was a Roman population, so long would there 
 be an anti-Arian Church. But as he would not suffer 
 the old inhabitants to own great wealth or to hold 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 4. 
 
 2 Procop., De Bello Vand., i. 7 ; Isidorus, Hispalemis Hist, Vand. 
 I 77. 
 
102 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 prominent positions, so he was determined not to grant 
 any official importance to the Catholics. 
 
 Such a policy necessitated much severity at first. 
 Influential clergy had to be removed ; the possessions 
 of the Church were confiscated, and the public services 
 discontinued. Moreover the national creed of the 
 Vandals needed support, and whence was it more 
 fitting to endow the Arian hierarchy than from the 
 rich coffers of their defeated rivals ? Therefore from 
 the first the churches and estates of the Catholics were 
 transferred to their conquerors and they were subjected 
 to galling restrictions. 
 
 But as soon as the Vandals were firmly seated in 
 their new homes and their Church seemed sufficiently 
 established, there was less need to persecute the 
 Catholics and the regulations were relaxed. Though 
 the persecution was renewed from time to time, some- 
 times by the king, more often by the unauthorized 
 outbreaks of the Vandals, it was rather dictated by 
 political motives and national jealousy than by hatred 
 for theological opponents. In fact under Gaiseric, the 
 Catholic Church in Africa though disestablished and 
 disendowed was not persecuted. This treatment is sur- 
 prisingly moderate. The Vandals were Arians, and at 
 this time the lines of division in doctrine and secular 
 affairs were almost coincident. Nearly all the invaders 
 of the Empire were Arians, and Rome herself was now 
 entirely Athanasian ; the contest between barbarian and 
 Roman seemed therefore to involve not only the fate of 
 the masters of the world but the creed of all mankind. 
 Under these circumstances there would have been 
 nothing extraordinary if the Vandals had tried to 
 
THE EISE OF THE VANDALS. 103 
 
 utterly stamp out African Catholicism; to tolerate or 
 at least shut their eyes to it as they did proves the 
 great political wisdom of their king, and this wisdom 
 was all the greater, if Gaiseric, as has been alleged, was 
 really an apostate from the Catholic Faith 1 . 
 
 Still though it is fair to praise the moderation 
 of the Vandals, it does not follow that there is no 
 need to pity those under their sway. The mercy of 
 barbarian conquerors and the chances of war are at 
 best cruel, and the African Church had to pass 
 through a very fiery trial before it reached the com- 
 parative quiet that marked the close of Gaiseric's 
 reign. The ravages of the invasion and the special 
 damage done to the churches and clergy have already 
 been described, and there is no need to repeat the 
 catalogue of horrors. There can be no doubt that 
 until peace was declared the ecclesiastical organization 
 of the distracted province was completely broken up, 
 and even before the death of St Augustine, the Churches 
 of Carthage, Hippo and Cirta alone survived 2 . When 
 order was restored, Leo the Great wrote to the bishops 
 of Mauritania Caesariensis 3 and rebuked them for the 
 state of their province ; and this letter, though addressed 
 to a part always more unruly than the rest of Africa, 
 betrays the extent to which the life of the Church had 
 suffered. 
 
 All decency and order had broken down ; the epis- 
 copate had become the prize of ambitious men and was 
 sought rather for the sake of power than for the oppor- 
 
 1 Isidor., Hispal. Hist. Valid., % 74. 
 
 2 Possidras, Vita S. Augmtini, i. 28. 3 Leo I., Ep. 12. 
 
104 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 tunity of doing good. Elections of bishops were made 
 with violence and confusion ; laymen were suddenly 
 consecrated without becoming priests or deacons, and 
 small sees were multiplied. The inferior orders were 
 in no better condition, and mere boys and neophytes 
 were ordained without adequate instruction. The rules 
 of the Church and of morality were disregarded; priests 
 were married for the second time, even though in some 
 cases their first wives were alive, and others were united 
 to widows. Such men could not be allowed to exercise 
 their sacred functions; but to other offenders less 
 severity was to be shewn. The hasty consecration of 
 bishops was to be regarded as valid, and the insignifi- 
 cant sees which had survived were permitted to re- 
 main; but in future hands were not to be laid upon 
 candidates for Holy Orders without due consideration, 
 and the small dioceses were to be united as vacancies 
 arose. The letter bears further witness to the violence 
 of the times by its decision as to the treatment of those 
 consecrated virgins who had suffered violence at the 
 hands of the invaders and their allies. 
 
 The deliberate harm done to the Catholics by 
 Gaiseric was actuated by two motives ; the establish- 
 ment of Arianism and the preservation of the Vandals 
 from conversion. To accomplish his first object, he 
 confiscated many of the churches and handed them 
 over to the heretical clergy. The basilica of St Celerina 
 or the Martyrs of Scillitana, where the holy bodies 
 of St Perpetua and St Felicitas reposed 1 , was thus 
 taken possession of by the Arian priests. At Carthage 2 , 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 3. s Victor Vit., i. 5. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 105 
 
 all the churches within the walls, notably one called 
 Restituta, were lost to the Catholics, and some of those 
 in the suburbs, and especially two dedicated to the 
 memory of St Cyprian, the great champion of orthodoxy, 
 shared the same fate. Some of the confiscated build- 
 ings were used for the Arian worship, but others were 
 turned into houses for the Vandal priests 1 . As the 
 Church of Carthage had owned great wealth, Gaiseric 
 was able to endow his national hierarchy without any 
 difficulty from its funds. 
 
 In spite of these confiscations the Catholics were in 
 the vast majority. A good many indeed tried to buy 
 the favour of the conquerors by renouncing the Faith 
 and becoming Arians 2 ; but the deflection of these did 
 not materially weaken the Church, and Gaiseric saw 
 that rigorous measures were necessary to protect his 
 own people from conversion. The problem before him 
 in ecclesiastical matters was identical with that pre- 
 sented by secular affairs. Once again he had to pre- 
 vent the undoing by sheer weight of numbers of the 
 work accomplished by force of arms ; and he adopted 
 the same wise and moderate policy to effect his object. 
 The defeated Catholics were deprived of their leaders 
 and were to be cut off from any opportunities of gaining 
 influence. Many of the clergy and bishops had been 
 killed and driven away during the conquest ; now 
 many more were exiled. Quodvultdeus, Bishop of 
 Carthage, and a large number of his clergy were placed 
 upon a ship, described by the prejudiced Victor as 
 
 1 Prosper Tyro, s.a. 439 ; Isidor., Hispal, Hist. Vand., 75. 
 
 2 Prosper, De Promissionibus Dei, iv. 5. 
 
106 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 unsea worthy, and bidden go whithersoever they would; 
 providentially they succeeded in reaching Italy and 
 landed in safety at Neapolis 1 . From the seat of govern- 
 ment at any rate all the Catholic clergy were to be 
 expelled, and three priests, who for a time escaped the 
 vigilance of the Vandals, were afterwards captured and 
 exiled. Moreover in Carthage the public worship of 
 the Arians was alone allowed and the Catholics were 
 even forbidden to practise their own funeral rites 2 . 
 
 Outside the city, in the country districts of the 
 Sortes Vandalorum, much the same measures were 
 ordained, but never effectually carried out. All Ca- 
 tholic worship was forbidden, but the clergy were not 
 expelled but simply ordered to abstain from their 
 ministrations, and the vacancies in their ranks, caused 
 by death or exile, were not to be refilled 3 . Probably 
 Gaiseric realized that a rigorous persecution would be 
 both dangerous and futile and hoped to slowly strangle 
 the Church, which he could not actively repress. In 
 the parts belonging to the king and inhabited almost 
 entirely by the Roman provincials, there was much 
 less persecution. For here there was no Arian hier- 
 archy to maintain and no Vandal population to save 
 from conversion ; and so, though isolated cases of 
 Catholics suffering for their faith may be found, and 
 though the clergy were exposed to vexatious accusa- 
 tions, the Church, harassed as it was, was never in 
 danger of actual extinction. 
 
 Even within the Sortes Vandalorum there was 
 much unavowed toleration, and as long as the Catholic 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 5. z Victor Vit., i. 5. » Victor Vit., i. 1, 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 107 
 
 priests did not force themselves upon the notice of the 
 conquerors, little heed was paid to the quiet work that 
 they were accomplishing. Their zeal however often 
 outran their discretion and they were too brave or too 
 fanatical to conform to the necessities of the time. As 
 soon as the decrees against Catholic worship in the 
 Sortes Vandalorum had gone forth, a deputation of 
 clergy and leading men waited upon Gaiseric at Li- 
 gula, a place on the sea-shore, and asked his permission 
 to live in peace amongst the Vandals and console their 
 afflicted people. Though no doubt they promised not 
 to interfere with the Arians, but one answer could 
 have been expected, and that was given with barbarian 
 ferocity. "I have decreed to grant nothing to your 
 name and race, and you dare to ask such things!" 
 thundered the angry king and ordered them to be 
 taken and drowned in the sea. But owing to the 
 remonstrances of the royal advisers the delegates were 
 permitted to depart 1 . 
 
 In spite of this repulse the Catholic clergy con- 
 tinued their ministrations in secret and as a rule 
 unmolested. But sometimes, perhaps galled by their 
 own position and the open victory of the heretics, 
 an incautious preacher would call to mind the glorious 
 deeds of the Jewish race and stigmatizing the Vandal 
 monarch as Pharaoh, Nebuchadnezzar, or Holofernes, 
 would pray for a national deliverer. At once the fear 
 of the Vandals was aroused and the rash speaker paid 
 for his words by his exile. Six bishops were in this 
 way driven from their sees or otherwise punished, but 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 5. 
 
108 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 the offence of only one of them has been recorded. 
 Felix of Adrumetum, in Byzacene, received a monk 
 named John from across the seas, and thus no doubt 
 seemed to be in political communication with the 
 Empire. He was banished, but of the other five, 
 Eustratius of Sufes, in Byzacene, Urbanus of Girba and 
 Habetdeus of Theudales, in Zeugitana, Crescens of 
 Aquae, the Metropolitan of Mauritania Caesariensis, 
 Vices of Sabrata and Cresconius of Oea, in Tripoli ; 
 not even their punishment is known 1 . Probably they 
 had offended by indiscreet boldness or had excited the 
 anger of some capricious official. They do not seem to 
 have been killed or tortured, and their distance from 
 one another makes it most unlikely that their sufferings 
 were due to definite policy. Their places were not 
 refilled ; but yet in spite of the disabilities of the 
 Church and the harassing of the Vandals the number 
 of the Catholics continually increased. 
 
 As time went on and the conquest of Africa became 
 recognized by all the world as the established order of 
 things, the restrictions on the Church were gradually 
 relaxed. In 452, the names of certain African bishops 
 occur amongst the signatories of the canons of the 
 Council of Chalcedon 2 ; probably these were merely 
 exiles, but if they were delegates it shews that the 
 ecclesiastical organization of Africa was already restored 
 and that the Vandal king had begun the policy of 
 toleration on which he was formally to enter in a few 
 years. For Gaiseric, as he saw the steady growth of 
 his prestige beyond his dominions and the absence of 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 7. * Ruinart, Hist. Persec. Vandal,, vi. 4. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 109 
 
 all domestic revolts, was more disposed to look with 
 contemptuous indifference than fear upon the Church 
 of his defeated subjects, and so, when Valentinian 
 interceded for the Catholics of Carthage, he was ready 
 to consider his requests. It was a proud moment for the 
 Vandal king. As the Emperor of the West, the former 
 master of Africa, was now a suppliant for bare justice 
 to his old people at the throne of a barbarian conqueror, 
 it may be fairly supposed that gratified vanity as much 
 as change of policy brought about Gaiseric's short-lived 
 toleration of the Church. But whatever his motive 
 may have been, on Sunday, the 25th of October, 454, 
 the king allowed Deogratias to be consecrated in the 
 Basilica of St Faustus, as Catholic Bishop of Carthage 1 . 
 Two churches at least, and perhaps a still larger 
 number, were restored to the Church and her ecclesias- 
 tical organization was once more permitted. 
 
 In bringing this about, Valentinian III. was un- 
 consciously preparing the greatest benefits for the 
 citizens of Rome herself. The year after the consecra- 
 tion of Deogratias saw the fall of the Imperial City and 
 the carrying off of thousands of her inhabitants. The 
 miserable captives were carried to Carthage and kept 
 there until they could be divided and sold to the 
 Vandals and their Moorish allies. The sea-voyage 
 in crowded ships and the violence of their captors had 
 broken down the health of many, and now they found 
 themselves face to face with all the horrors of slavery 
 in the hot climate of Africa. To them in their awful 
 plight the restored Church held out a helping hand; 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 8 ; Prosper Tyro, Mtio et Studio Goss. 
 
110 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 the Basilicas of St Faustus and Novae were fitted up 
 for the care of the sick, money was freely spent and the 
 gold and silver vessels of the altar were melted down to 
 prevent the breaking up of families or other more 
 terrible effects of bondage. 
 
 Deogratias earned by his devotion and self-sacrifice 
 both the respect and hatred of his enemies. They 
 could not deny his virtues, but they feared his example 
 would turn many from Arianism. They made him the 
 mark of continual accusations and insults, but he was too 
 popular to be safely attacked and for three years he 
 was able to continue his good works and ministration. 
 In 457 the saintly bishop passed away, and so great 
 was the veneration in which he was held, that it was 
 necessary to keep secret the place of his burial, in order 
 to preserve his body from the too zealous hands of 
 those who sought for relics of their beloved pastor 1 . 
 
 Gaiseric refused to allow the consecration of a suc- 
 cessor to Deogratias, and perhaps alarmed by his 
 popularity and the devotion his holy life had aroused, 
 once more revived the persecution. He renewed the 
 decree against the filling of vacant sees in the Procon- 
 sular province and visited the ordination of priests 
 with the severest penalties. If the life of the Church 
 had solely depended upon its overseers, it would have 
 been now nearly stamped out. Where once there had 
 been one hundred and sixty-four bishops, only three 
 were left ; Vincent of Gigga and Paul 2 of Sinna still 
 occupied their dioceses, but the third, Quintian, was 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 8. 
 
 2 This bishop is described by Victor (i. 9), as "vere merito et 
 nomine Paulus." 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. Ill 
 
 in exile at Edessa, a town in Macedonia. The tenets 
 of Catholicism, however, were far too deeply rooted 
 in the hearts of the Africans to be easily destroyed 
 and the severity of the Arians only evoked still further 
 proof of the Church's sincerity. Many Catholics now 
 earned the crown of martyrdom, and a still larger 
 number suffered grievously rather than renounce their 
 faith. 
 
 The story of Martinian, Saturian, their two brothers 
 and Maxima shews the inefficacy of the Vandal perse- 
 cution. These five were the household slaves of a 
 member of Gaiseric's bodyguard, Martinian being 
 his armourer and Maxima his housekeeper. The Vandal 
 treated them kindly, and, seeing that Maxima was 
 as beautiful as she was good, thought that if he gave 
 her to Martinian as his wife he would make them both 
 contented in his service. But Maxima had devoted 
 herself to a life of continence and persuaded her 
 husband to respect her vows. Moreover she induced 
 him to lead a religious life and urged him to win over 
 his brothers also. They all now deserted their Vandal 
 master and betook themselves to Tabraca, a village on 
 the borders of Zeugitana and Numidia, where the four 
 men entered a monastery, and Maxima joined a convent 
 hard by. As soon as their escape was known a vigorous 
 hue and cry was raised, but it was only after many en- 
 quiries had been made and many bribes had been given 
 that their retreat was discovered. They were recaptured, 
 imprisoned and scourged; but though their faith was un- 
 shaken, a curse seemed to fall on all who oppressed them. 
 An appeal was made to Gaiseric and he released Maxima 
 and directed that the men should be sent to Capsur the 
 
112 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Moor in the desert of Capra Picta. Their exile affected 
 them as little as their former sufferings and they set 
 themselves to spread the Gospel among their captors 
 with extraordinary success. A great multitude of Moors 
 were baptized, a bishop was summoned from the Roman 
 province and a church was built. The rapid growth of 
 Christianity alarmed the Moorish king — he asked the 
 help of Gaiseric. The Vandal monarch saw that 
 nothing could put a stop to the zeal of the exiles but 
 death. His advice was taken and they were all com- 
 pelled to lay down their lives for their faith 1 . 
 
 The story of these martyrs throws great light upon 
 the condition of Africa at this time ; it illustrates the 
 relations of conquerors and conquered, and shews 
 how far the persecution of the Arians had been a 
 success. The treatment of the five slaves was evidently 
 far from unkind. Two of them at any rate occupied 
 positions of great importance and trust, and their 
 master realized their value and did his best to make 
 them happy. There was none of the barbaric tyranny 
 which the conquest seemed to foreshadow, and the 
 Vandals once firmly settled in Africa seem to have 
 indulged in no unnecessary severity. When the slaves 
 fled, they were able to effect their escape, and it was 
 only with considerable trouble that their refuge was 
 discovered. No doubt their hiding-place was some- 
 what inaccessible ; but it is very remarkable that in 
 this persecuted land any place should be found safe 
 enough for two religious communities. So far the 
 Arians had accomplished little, and even in the Procon- 
 
 1 Viotor Vit., i. 10—11. 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 113 
 
 sular Province, the district especially given up to the 
 Vandals and subject to the greatest oppression, the posi- 
 tion of the Catholic Church was still but little impaired. 
 
 Gaiseric recognized his failure and the escape of 
 Martinian and Maxima urged him to redouble his efforts 
 against Catholicism. Proculus was appointed to Zeugi- 
 tana, with orders to use his utmost efforts to stamp out 
 the faith of Nicaea. The new attack was aimed rather 
 at the efficiency than the lives of the clergy, and it was 
 hoped in this manner to disarm the Catholics. Their 
 churches were ravaged, the sacred vessels were de- 
 stroyed, the Scriptures were seized, and the altar-cloths 
 and vestments made into garments (camisias et femo- 
 ralia) by the soldiers. If any priest tried to protect his 
 church he was imprisoned and tortured. For refusing to 
 comply with the demands of the spoilers Bishop Valerian 
 of Abensa, though over eighty years of age, was driven 
 away from his see, and so strict were the orders against 
 shewing him any hospitality that for a long time this 
 aged man had to sleep in the open air. This outburst 
 as long as it lasted was very terrible, but it speedily 
 came to a close. Proculus was seized with a loathsome 
 disease, and with his death the zeal of the persecutors 
 seems to have waned 1 . 
 
 Gaiseric's attempt to expel all Catholics from the 
 civil service may be perhaps ascribed to this period. 
 If it was ever intended to be more than a declaration of 
 policy, it cannot have taken place early in his reign ; 
 as until the Church had been persecuted for some time 
 the rigid enforcement of the decree would have meant 
 the disorganization of the whole administration. As it 
 i Victor Vit., i. 12. 
 H. 8 
 
114 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 was, the order, like other measures of Arian intolerance, 
 was not thoroughly enforced. Probably if a Government 
 employ^ forced his views upon the notice of his superiors 
 he suffered for his imprudence; but as long as the 
 Catholics kept silence as to their creed, no question 
 was asked 1 . 
 
 Outside the Sortes much the same religious policy 
 was pursued as within it ; but here the numbers of the 
 Arians were much smaller and there was far less risk in 
 clinging to Catholicism. The Church, as long as it was 
 unobtrusive, was safe ; as soon as it made too open 
 advances, it was persecuted. At Tunuzuda, Gales and 
 Vicus Ammoniae, Arian mobs attacked the orthodox as 
 they celebrated the Lord's Supper, and mingled the 
 blood of martyrs with the consecrated elements. At 
 Regia, in Numidia, the Catholics reopened their church 
 one Easter-Day, but in the midst of their worship the 
 Arians, led by Anderit, a priest, burst in, slew the lector 
 as he sang the Alleluia (alleluiaticum melos) in the 
 pulpit, massacred a large number of the congregation 
 where they were, and afterwards led out many others to 
 torture 2 . Such atrocities as these no doubt occurred 
 from time to time, but it would be wrong to see in them 
 any settled policy; they were rather the spasmodic and 
 spontaneous outbursts of religious fanaticism and racial 
 hate, and were quite ineffectual in hindering the spread 
 of the Catholic faith. 
 
 In fact the names of very few martyrs have been 
 recorded at all, and it is very noticeable that all those 
 persecuted by Gaiseric himself were men of prominent 
 position. He seems to have passed over in contempt 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 14. 2 Ibid< t 13 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 115 
 
 the Catholics of minor rank, and noticed only those 
 whose stedfastness was an encouragement and whose 
 sufferings would be a warning to their fellow-believers. 
 As early as 437, four Spaniards, Arcadius, Probus, 
 Paschasius and Eutychius, had suffered for their faith 1 . 
 They were distinguished amongst the servants of the 
 king for their wisdom and fidelity and every effort was 
 made to turn them to Arianism. However they stood 
 firm; and first proscribed, then exiled and tortured, 
 they at length won their martyrs' crowns. Paschillus, 
 the young brother of Paschasius and Eutychius, followed 
 their example and bore scourgings and slavery rather 
 than change his faith. 
 
 In the case of Sebastian, Gaiseric used religious 
 differences as a mere pretext to get rid of a dangerous 
 guest. In 440, the son-in-law of Boniface took refuge 
 in Africa during the absence of its conqueror in Sicily. 
 Gaiseric felt the danger of allowing so distinguished a 
 soldier and statesman to be at Carthage, and feared 
 that he would head the discontented Vandals and seize 
 the kingdom for himself, or would try to recover Africa 
 in order to make his peace with Valentinian III. The 
 Sicilian expedition was therefore abandoned, and re- 
 turning quickly home Gaiseric got rid of his unwelcome 
 guest on the plea of his Catholicism 2 . 
 
 The three other sufferers, whose names are recorded, 
 were all well-known men, and one at least had incurred 
 the wrath of the king by his missionary zeal. Armo- 
 gasta was in the service of the king's son Theoderic, 
 
 1 Prosper, s.a. 441 ; Prosper Tyro, s.a. 437. 
 
 " Prosper Tyro, s.a. 440; Victor Vit., I. 6; Bury's Fragments, 
 vol. iv., p. 612 ; Suidas, p. 194. 
 
 8—2 
 
116 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Mascula was the Arch-mime at Carthage ; Saturus was 
 the procurator of the household of Hunneric and a 
 very rich man. To have such distinguished men 
 professing the Catholic creed bespoke the weakness 
 of the State religion ; but it was most important that 
 their punishment should not rouse the zeal of their 
 fellow-believers. Theoderic, after putting Armogasta 
 to the torture, wished to behead him, but was stayed 
 by Jucundus, an Arian priest, who maintained that 
 if a Catholic was deliberately slain, the enthusiasm 
 aroused by his constancy would more than counter- 
 balance the fear caused by his death ; if on the other 
 hand he was ill-treated and killed by inches, it would 
 be far more difficult for the Church to bestow on him 
 the veneration of a martyr. This diabolical advice was 
 followed; Armogasta was put to the roughest field 
 labour and slowly done to death 1 . 
 
 The same policy was adopted in the case of Mascula. 
 As he would not be bribed to embrace Arianism he was 
 condemned to death, but peculiar instructions were 
 given to the executioners. If the prisoner shewed 
 the least signs of fear at the sight of the uplifted sword 
 he was to be slain at once ; a troublesome subject 
 would be punished and the Catholics could not claim a 
 martyr. But if he stood firm he was to be spared ; for 
 to add a witness to the truth of Catholicism would only 
 hurt the Arian cause. Even when face to face with 
 death Mascula refused to quail and was only able to 
 earn the confessor's crown a . 
 
 Saturus brought upon himself the wrath of the 
 Vandals by preaching against their heresies. He was 
 1 Victor Vit., 1. 14. • i bid . t I# 15 
 
THE RISE OF THE VANDALS. 117 
 
 offered great riches, if he would keep silence, but 
 was threatened with the loss of all his fortune and 
 separation from his children, and, worse than all, was 
 told that his wife would be forced into a loathsome 
 union with a camel-driver, if he persisted. But nothing 
 could turn him from his course ; despite the tears and 
 pathetic entreaties of his family, Saturus chose poverty 
 and bereavement rather than defile his baptismal robe 
 by becoming a convert to Arianism 1 . 
 
 The proscription of the Catholics seemed likely to 
 last until the end of Gaiseric's reign, but a change in 
 the political situation afforded them relief. The year 
 before he died the Vandal conqueror arranged a peace 
 with the emperor Zeno, by which he bound himself 
 to grant religious toleration to his subjects. The 
 Catholics were therefore allowed to reopen their 
 churches, and the bishops and clergy were recalled from 
 exile 2 . Gaiseric did not long survive this concession ; 
 in 477 he died, after a reign of 37 years, 3 months and 
 6 days, and was succeeded by Hunneric his son 3 . 
 
 During all these years the Catholic Church had 
 been liable to persecution, and if the contemptuous 
 indifference of the Vandals left it occasionally unmo- 
 lested, the least exhibition of its power, the slightest 
 imprudence of its priests, or the mere caprice of its 
 enemies were enough at any time to subject it to the 
 direst perils. It had lost its officers, its buildings and 
 its wealth. It had seen some of its members fall away 
 and others seal their faith with their blood ; but it had 
 
 i Victor Vit., i. 16. 
 
 2 Ibid., i. 17 : Cassiodorus Chron., s.a. last year of Zeno. 
 
 3 Prosper Tyro, vn., Theodosio et Festo, Coss. 
 
118 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 not lost ground. Indeed it even grew in real power 
 and authority. The Gospel had been spread among 
 the Moors; some of the Arians had been converted, and 
 the persecution itself was the best proof of the genuine 
 dread felt by the Vandals, even in their day of triumph, 
 of its influence and strength. 
 
 Gaiseric had tried to drive all Catholics from the 
 civil service ; but he failed. Armogasta, in the hour 
 of his death, could appeal to Felix, procurator of the 
 house of the king's son, as a fellow-Catholic 1 ; and in 
 the next reign the edict against the employment of 
 Catholics by the State had to be renewed. The in- 
 scriptions that have survived the wear and tear of 
 fourteen centuries shew that even in this reign the 
 Church enjoyed some peace. The epitaphs erected to 
 the priest Boniface at Tiaret in Mauritania Caesariensis 
 in 461 and to Januarus in 449 ~ are evidence that the 
 Catholics were able to pay the last rites to their de- 
 parted brethren. In the more inaccessible parts of 
 Africa Catholic monasteries still existed in security. 
 
 In fact the Arians had failed, and they knew it. 
 They could not do without the Catholics, and they dared 
 not rouse their zeal. The utmost they could do was to 
 drive the Church into hiding and to prevent it from 
 making open profession of its creed. Gaiseric himself 
 was half-hearted in religious questions and did not 
 scruple to alter his attitude toward the Catholics if 
 policy required him to do so. As long as the Arians 
 feared to risk a final conflict, as long as the Catholics 
 were true to themselves, the Church of Carthage could 
 suffer no irreparable loss. 
 
 1 Victor Vit., ±. 14. 2 C. I. L., vol. vm. 9731, 9271. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 The Reign of Hunneric. 
 
 With the accession of Hunneric the decay of the 
 Vandals began. When they crossed the Straits of 
 Gibraltar they were inured to fatigue and war and were 
 a terrible fighting machine, but for fifty years they had 
 lived in the hot climate of Africa and had enjoyed the 
 fruits of others' toil and were already losing their former 
 energy. No longer did they ravage the shores of the 
 Mediterranean, being hardly able to maintain their hold 
 on the lands their fathers had won. Consequently this 
 reign presents few prominent features, and the relations 
 of Hunneric with other nations can be very briefly 
 described by saying that with the Eastern Empire he 
 was at peace, and Odoacer, king of Italy, agreed to pay 
 him tribute for Sicily. 
 
 His position was indeed not such as to invite an 
 active foreign policy. He was secure from attacks 
 from abroad and was continually exposed to them at 
 home. For now that Gaiseric was dead, the Moors of 
 the border again resumed their raids on the Province. 
 Hunneric, it may be, cared little about the miseries of 
 his non- Vandal subjects, but at any rate the folly of 
 
120 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Gaiseric in denuding the frontier towns of their de- 
 fences now became manifest owing to conquests of the 
 utmost importance being made by the barbarians in 
 this reign. They overran Numidia and made it practi- 
 cally their own, carrying their raids into the very 
 heart of the Province. But far more important than 
 any number of plundering expeditions was the capture 
 of Mount Aurasius. This rocky tableland raises its 
 precipitous sides on the southern borders of Numidia 
 and is one of the chief strategic positions in all 
 Africa. It is only thirteen days' march from Car- 
 thage, and includes within its limits a large tract of 
 fruitful and well-watered land. An enemy established 
 there could form his head-quarters on the summit 
 in almost perfect security, and descend at will to 
 ravage the plains in every direction. Once fortified it 
 was extremely hard to take, and the steep approaches 
 were the despair of an attacking force. It remained 
 impregnable to the Vandals, and even the soldiers of 
 Belisarius under the brave and skilful Solomon had 
 the utmost difficulty in recapturing it 1 . From this 
 time for over fifty years the Moors from this strong 
 position were able almost entirely to cut off Numidia 
 and Mauritania from the other parts of Africa 2 . 
 
 The Catholics under Hunneric underwent strange 
 vicissitudes. At first they were barely tolerated ; then 
 for a few years they enjoyed practical freedom of wor- 
 ship ; finally they had to face a persecution terrible 
 alike for its relentless vigour and its systematic organi- 
 zation. Such extraordinary changes as these would 
 have been impossible if the king had had any real 
 
 1 Prooop. De Bell. Valid., n. 19. 2 Ibid. , i. 7. 
 
THE REIGN OF HUNNERIC. 121 
 
 religious convictions ; but having none, he appears to 
 have considered that to the adroit statesman all sects 
 and all theological disputes were equally useful. He 
 attempted to employ the religious quarrels of his 
 subjects for his own advantage, and tried alternately 
 toleration and persecution to bend the Catholics to his 
 own political ends. Of course he was nominally an 
 Arian, and was quite prepared to insist upon the 
 supremacy of his theological views when it suited his 
 turn, but he did not see in the prevalence of Catholicism 
 any reason for oppressing the greater part of his subjects, 
 and was quite willing to grant them toleration as the 
 price of domestic peace. 
 
 The Catholics, on their side, had to keep to the 
 tacit agreement under which they enjoyed toleration by 
 remembering that as a conquered race they were bound 
 to defer to their master's wishes. If they made no 
 attempts to convert the Vandals and were prepared to 
 blindly support the royal policy they might hope for 
 permission to practise their religion. But as the con- 
 sciences of the Catholics would not suffer them to 
 observe the first condition, their attempts to propagate 
 their opinions drewdownupon them the royaldispleasure. 
 The whole machinery of the State and the bitter fanati- 
 cism of the Arians were turned against them, and so 
 grinding and relentless were the trials of the Church 
 that it may well be supposed that only the death of the 
 king saved Catholicism in Africa from total extinction. 
 
 The last year of Gaiseric had seen some sort of 
 toleration granted to the Church in Carthage, and the 
 new king left things as they were, for a time neither 
 extending nor curtailing the privileges of the Catholics. 
 
122 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 In this Victor sees the "craft of barbarians," and declares 
 that Hunneric wished to entice the orthodox into indis- 
 cretions for which they might have to atone with 
 heavy penalties 1 . There can be no doubt that the 
 Vandal monarch was quite capable of such a policy, 
 but a simpler and far less discreditable explanation 
 of his actions is perfectly possible. 
 
 To a small military aristocracy like the Vandals 
 the existence of the indigenous population was indis- 
 pensable, nor was Hunneric likely to estrange the great 
 majority of his subjects by deliberately insulting their 
 religious convictions without sufficiently urgent provo- 
 cation. 
 
 While the Catholics were unmolested, Hunneric 
 devoted his energies to the suppression of heresy. 
 Manichaeism had always found many supporters in 
 Africa, and, despite the efforts of St Augustine, was 
 now more firmly seated at Carthage than in any other 
 part of the world. If we are to believe the Catholic 
 historian this fatal heresy attracted chiefly those whose 
 creed gave them a less firm grip of Christian principles 
 than that of Nicaea, nor were the Arian clergy un- 
 affected by its baneful doctrines. The king, regarding 
 the spread of Manichaean teaching as a social danger, 
 attacked the whole sect, without respect to nationality 
 or religion. A few Manichaeans were burnt and many 
 were exiled, and so severe were Hunneric's measures 
 against this dreaded sect that in Africa we hear no 
 more of its influence, though it had yet many centuries 
 of vitality in other parts of Christendom 2 . 
 
 1 Victor Vit., n. 1. 
 
 2 Victor Vit., n. 1; Neander, vol. iv. p. 447. 
 
THE REIGN OF HUNNERIC. 123 
 
 In 479, when Hunneric had been two years on the 
 throne, the Catholics received still further privileges 
 and experienced once more a brief period of sunshine. 
 Placidia, the widow of Olybrius, one of the short- 
 lived emperors of the West, the sister-in-law of the king, 
 united with the emperor Zeno in beseeching leave for 
 the Church of Carthage to elect a bishop of their own. 
 The required permission was given, on condition that 
 Zeno should extend a similar toleration to the Arians 
 in his dominions; but if the emperor broke this bargain, 
 all the orthodox bishops of Africa were liable to be driven 
 into exile among the Moors. But although Zeno accepted 
 the proffered terms it was a far harder matter to induce 
 the ecclesiastical authorities of the Church of Carthage 
 to do the same. For since, as they plausibly argued, any 
 violation of the treaty on the part of the emperor was 
 liable to draw down upon their innocent heads an 
 unmerited punishment, it was better to be content 
 with Christ as their only Head, than to exchange 
 their peaceful obscurity for a dangerous privilege. 
 However their fears were overruled. The Imperial 
 legate Alexander attended their consultations and 
 would receive no answer but an acceptance of the 
 terms ; and as the Catholic laity were clamouring for a 
 visible head with all the enthusiasm of the African 
 character and were in no temper to brook a refusal, 
 the ecclesiastical authorities had no alternative but to 
 yield, and on June 18, 479, elected Eugenius to the 
 long vacant see 1 . 
 
 It was twenty-three years since the last Bishop of 
 Carthage had died and during that time the Church 
 1 Victor Vit., n. 1—3. 
 
124 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 had been without a head. Many young men testified 
 that they had never known what it was to have a 
 bishop over them, and welcomed the consecration of 
 Eugenius with the utmost joy and thankfulness. He 
 was well worthy of their respect and love, and set 
 himself at once to give a noble example of good works. 
 The organization of the Church was restored by him ; 
 vacant sees and livings were refilled, and the com- 
 munities of women consecrated to a life of charity were 
 once more established. All that he had Eugenius 
 gave to the poor, only keeping for himself the bare 
 necessaries of life, and by his self-sacrifice he aroused the 
 enthusiasm of his flock. Large sums of money were 
 given him to distribute, and it was a wonder how a 
 Church, so often plundered and so terribly oppressed, 
 could afford such vast amounts for charitable purposes. 
 Still no fear of poverty disturbed the bishop, and with 
 a noble faith that the supply would not cease, he gave 
 away daily all the money as soon as it was given to 
 him 1 . 
 
 In spite of his holy life he could not escape the 
 malignity and false accusations of the Arian clergy. 
 At first Cyrila, their patriarch, tried to arouse the 
 anger of Hunneric by declaring that Eugenius was not 
 worthy of his position and refused to preach the Word 
 of God to his people. Such a statement as this was 
 palpably false, and the Arians prepared a much more 
 subtle attack by affirming that admission to the 
 Catholic churches was refused to all in Vandal costume. 
 If Eugenius admitted this, it would be easy to infer 
 that the Church was organizing at its services a 
 
 1 Victor Vit., i. 3. 
 
THE REIGN OF HUNNERIC. 125 
 
 rebellion against its persecutors ; if he denied it, it was 
 clear that the Vandals were dangerously attracted by 
 the orthodox creed. However but one reply could be 
 truthfully given, — no man was excluded from the 
 Catholic services, however he was dressed. It could 
 not be otherwise ; the House of God was open to all, 
 and, as many of the orthodox wore the Vandal costume 
 as household servants of the king, to shut out all those 
 who appeared to be Vandals would cause the exclusion 
 of many of the faithful. 
 
 But by one accusation or another the Arian clergy 
 had achieved their object and had aroused the fears of 
 the king. He determined to stamp out Catholicism 
 at any rate amongst his personal entourage, and issued 
 peculiarly cruel orders. Soldiers were stationed at the 
 Catholic churches armed with combs with long, sharp 
 teeth. When any man in Vandal dress tried to enter, 
 they were to cast these terrible instruments into their 
 hair and drag them from the doors. This brutal order 
 was brutally carried out. Such violence was used that 
 the scalps of some were torn away ; some lost their 
 eyesight, others died of pain, and the women were 
 dragged in derision through the streets. In spite of 
 all, not one Catholic changed his faith, and Hunneric 
 had to alter his policy and try less violent but more 
 effectual remedies. He deprived the officials who 
 refused to conform to Arianism of their pay and 
 allowance and condemned some of them to the roughest 
 field labour in the plains of Utica '. 
 
 The persecution soon became general; but the 
 anger of Hunneric was excited against the Church, 
 
 1 Victor Vit., n. 3, 4. 
 
126 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 less by its success than by the political situation of 
 the time. The king found himself growing old. He 
 must have been nearly a man when Valentinian re- 
 ceived him as a hostage in 435, and he cannot now 
 have been less than sixty. By the rules for the suc- 
 cession devised by Gaiseric the kingdom was always to 
 belong to the eldest male of the royal stock, and would 
 pass to Theoderic and the children of Genzo before 
 Hunneric's own son could succeed. The king therefore 
 planned to remove those who stood between Hilderic 
 and the throne. To do so meant wholesale murder, 
 but from this he did not shrink. Theoderic, his wife 
 and children, and Godagis, son of Genzo, were either 
 banished or slain ; Jucundus, the Arian priest, and 
 many of the Vandal nobility suffered death or condem- 
 nation to slavery. Such cruelties as these needed 
 a strong king, and to whom was Hunneric to look for 
 support ? The Vandal nobility which formed the back- 
 bone of the Arian party were already estranged by the 
 cruelty with which Hunneric had treated the royal 
 house. On the other hand, the oppressed Catholics 
 had experienced comparative kindness, and as a subject 
 people they had little reason to care if their conquerors 
 exterminated each other. To the Catholics therefore 
 Hunneric appealed and offered complete freedom of 
 worship in return for their support. 
 
 As however it was impossible for them to buy 
 toleration at the price of murder and robbery, their 
 refusal exasperated the king. He saw his plans 
 checkmated and his own people alienated without 
 advantage to himself. The despised race, whom he 
 had meant to help, scorned his favours, thwarted his 
 
THE REIGN OF HUNNERIC. 127 
 
 hopes and left him without support in his perilous 
 position. Policy and revenge urged him in the same 
 direction; by persecuting the Catholics he would at 
 once convince the Catholics of the folly of spurning 
 his offers and regain the loyalty of the Arians 1 . 
 
 Still Hunneric's ambition had led him into an 
 awkward situation and there was a danger of driving the 
 provincials to despair before the confidence of the Vandals 
 had been restored. For a time he had need of great 
 caution and decided to adopt the old policy of Gaiseric 
 rather than rush at once into wholesale massacres and 
 deportations. With this purpose it was again decreed 
 that all Catholics in the army, civil service and royal 
 household must become Arians or take the consequences 
 of contumacy. Those who refused were exiled, and 
 many were driven to Sicily and Sardinia, or were forced 
 to live as hermits in the Numidian deserts near Sicca, 
 Veneria, and Lares. For a short time the organization 
 of the Catholics was not directly attacked and the king 
 was satisfied with trying to cripple and impoverish it. 
 As long as a bishop lived, he was left in peace ; but 
 when a see fell vacant, the treasury seized its estates 
 and exacted a fine of 500 solidi before a new prelate 
 could be consecrated. 
 
 Comparatively mild as this persecution was, it 
 alarmed the royal advisers, and they pointed out how 
 greatly it endangered the position of the Arian clergy 
 in Thrace and the rest of the Imperial dominions. But 
 they could not turn Hunneric from his course, and he 
 sought in every direction an excuse for an avowed 
 persecution throughout the Province. The communities 
 
 1 Victor Vit., n. 5. 
 
128 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 of women devoted to the service of the Church attracted 
 his attention and he determined to cast suspicion upon 
 them. The Vandals seem to have paid no reverence 
 to the ascetic virtues, and eagerly sought for proofs that 
 the nuns had proved faithless to their vows of chastity, 
 and that their priests had been guilty of incontinence. 
 The consecrated virgins were seized and subjected 
 to an examination of the grossest and most painful 
 character. Some died of shame and torture, others 
 were crippled for life ; but this atrocity revealed no 
 scandals, and the morality of the clergy was triumphantly 
 vindicated against all defamers 1 . 
 
 Hunneric, undaunted by his failure, was still de- 
 termined upon persecution, and decided to try to root 
 out the Catholics altogether by one drastic measure. 
 Still following his father's tactics, he devoted all his 
 energies to exterminating the clergy, trusting that 
 the laity would be compliant when deprived of their 
 spiritual advisers. On one day nearly five thousand 
 ecclesiastics 2 of all ranks were torn from their homes 
 and in one mournful procession were driven into 
 exile and misery. The weight of years or of sickness 
 gave no protection ; all alike were forced to face the 
 terrors of the desert and the barbarities of the Moors. 
 Some could hardly walk through infirmity, others were 
 blind through old age. Felix, the venerable Bishop of 
 Abbir Major, stricken with paralysis and no longer able 
 to speak or feel, was bound like a log of wood upon a 
 mule and carried far away from his home and friends. 
 
 1 Victor Vit., n. 7. 
 
 2 The exact number given by Victor (n. 8) varies according to 
 the reading from 4776 to 4976. 
 
THE REIGN OF HUNNERIC. 129 
 
 The long march from Zeugitana through Sicca and 
 Lares to the desert caused the most terrible privations. 
 Worn out by the rough road and exhausted by the 
 burning sun, the miserable travellers found little rest 
 even by night; for, forced into narrow prisons of in- 
 describable filth, they were packed like "locusts or 
 grains of corn," and found sleep an impossibility. Many 
 fainted by the way or were too weak to go on; but 
 their Moorish guards tied their feet together and 
 dragged them along like the carcases of dead animals 
 over the rough mountain roads. The terrible injuries 
 inflicted by the " sharp swords of the rocks " put an 
 end to all their sufferings. 
 
 Even in their direst need this noble band of martyrs 
 were not without comfort. The Catholics along their 
 route came out to give what help they could, and the 
 knowledge that it was their faith for which they bled 
 supported the minds of all. A few, it is true, fell away, 
 but most, cheered by their fellow-sufferer, Cyprian, the 
 saintly Bishop of Unuzibira, endured to the end. The 
 survivors at length reached the deserts, only to face 
 new hardships. At first their persecutors had allowed 
 them a miserable ration of barley, the food of brute 
 beasts ; but even this was soon taken from them. Yet 
 in spite of the peril of starvation and in spite of the 
 scorpions and poisonous insects, with which the land of 
 their exile abounded, the Hand of God sheltered them 
 still and they were preserved from every danger 1 . The 
 ultimate fate of these confessors is not known, and 
 there are no records to tell whether they gradually 
 found their way back to their homes or continued to 
 1 Victor Vit., n. 8—12; Victor of Tunno, s. a. 475. 
 
 H. 9 
 
130 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 drag on a miserable existence amongst the barbarians 
 of the mountains. 
 
 Hunneric was by no means satisfied with the simple 
 crippling of the Church's activity, and set himself to 
 organize a systematic persecution throughout Africa. 
 He went far beyond Gaiseric's methods and determined 
 to turn the whole machinery of the State against the 
 Catholics. But to be successful in so thorough a 
 scheme it was necessary to win the sympathy of all 
 his officials and to make sure that none of them would 
 favour the oppressed Church. He was, moreover, as 
 yet unwilling to throw over his friendship with Zeno 
 and he therefore made a great show of enquiring into 
 the theological disputes of the Catholics and Arians. 
 On May 20, 483, in the presence of Reginus, the 
 Imperial ambassador, a letter was drawn up and de- 
 spatched by fleet horses to Eugenius and his fellow 
 bishops. In this it was stated that, contrary to edicts, 
 often reissued, the Catholics had held meetings and 
 celebrated the Eucharist in the Sortes Vandalorum. 
 As therefore Hunneric wished the provinces committed 
 by God to his care to be free from any causes of offence, 
 he summoned all the Catholic bishops to a conference 
 with the Arian prelates on the subject of the Homo- 
 ousion of the Son with the Father, promising them 
 a safe conduct and considerate treatment \ 
 
 This letter spread the utmost consternation amongst 
 the Catholics, and they at once foresaw that the con- 
 ference was only the prelude of a terrible persecution. 
 Eugenius feared that freedom of speech would not be 
 allowed, and was convinced that the only hope of fair 
 1 Victor Vit., n. 13. 
 
THE EEIGN OF HUNNERIC. 131 
 
 treatment lay in the presence of foreigners, who could 
 report throughout the civilized world the sufferings 
 they were soon to endure. He begged Obadus, the chief 
 minister of Hunneric, to allow representatives to attend 
 from the other Christian countries, and especially from 
 Rome, "which is the head of all Churches," in order 
 that a matter, which concerned all Christendom, should 
 be discussed by the delegates of all Christendom. His 
 request was refused, and with fear and trembling the 
 Catholic bishops prepared to assemble at Carthage 1 . 
 
 In the meantime the action of the king did not 
 tend to allay their apprehensions. The persecutions 
 continued, and were aimed especially at those who 
 were the chief pillars of the Church. Secundianus, 
 bishop of Mimiana, was beaten with 150 stripes and 
 driven from the country. Praesidius, bishop of Su- 
 fetula, was exiled. Mansuetus, Germanus, Fusculus 
 and many others were scourged. The Arians were for- 
 bidden to meet the Catholics in social intercourse, and 
 just before the conference met, Laetus, bishop of Nepte, 
 who had been in prison for some time, was burned to 
 death. But, whatever were their forebodings, the 
 Catholics were bound to obey the royal commands, and 
 on the appointed day four hundred and sixty-one 
 orthodox bishops from every part of Africa and even 
 from the islands subject to the Vandals met together 
 in Carthage 2 . 
 
 The conference was postponed a few days to give the 
 Catholics every convenience for assembling, but when it 
 met the surroundings were not such as to restore their 
 confidence. They found Cyrila, their chief enemy, with 
 
 1 Victor Vit., n. 14, 15. 2 Ibid., ii. 16—18. 
 
 9—2 
 
132 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 his followers gathered round him, seated upon a lofty 
 throne, while they were expected to humbly stand at 
 its base. This augured no good, and their position 
 seemed that of suppliants, not of parties to a free 
 debate. Still they decided to make the best of matters 
 and agreed to choose ten spokesmen from their ranks, 
 lest it should be said that they tried to win by sheer 
 weight of numbers 1 . 
 
 An impartial judge was evidently the first thing to 
 secure and the Catholics at once raised the point. They 
 were always glad, they said, to meet their opponents in 
 fair fight, but who was to be the assessor of this dis- 
 cussion? The royal secretary replied, " The Patriarch 
 Cyrila," and the impossibility of an impartial con- 
 ference was at once revealed. Such an appointment 
 was palpably unfair ; it implied the entrusting of the 
 final award to one of the parties to the dispute, and it 
 was absurd to say that the Arian patriarch would give 
 the victory to anyone but his own followers. It was 
 natural enough that the Catholics should object most 
 strongly to such an arrangement, but it cannot be said 
 they acted wisely in this crisis. They ought to have 
 entered a dignified protest and demanded another 
 judge, or they might have withdrawn from the con- 
 ference altogether. Instead of this they obscured the 
 main point at issue, raised the whole controversy at 
 once and roused all the passions of the audience, by 
 enquiring with what authority Cyrila claimed the title 
 of " Patriarch." At once a tumult arose and all argu- 
 ment was impossible. Victor declares that the Arians 
 themselves were responsible for the confusion, Cyrila 
 
 1 For this conference see Victor Vit., n. 15 ; rv. 2 ; Hefele, iv. 35. 
 
THE REIGN OF HUNNEEIC. 133 
 
 blamed the Catholic spectators, and as he was in authority 
 the latter view prevailed. Every Catholic present was 
 scourged with 100 strokes, and in spite of Eugenius' 
 protesting cry, "May God see the violence we suffer ; 
 may He know the persecution which we undergo from 
 the persecutors!" the body of the hall was cleared of all 
 but Arians. 
 
 When quiet was restored the Catholics set them- 
 selves to the business in hand, and addressing the 
 President in Latin, begged him to state the subjects 
 for discussion. Cyrila answered, " I do not know 
 Latin," and again the anger of the orthodox rose. 
 The reply was evidently a subterfuge to prevent any 
 definite decision; and they declared that before now 
 they had heard the self-styled Patriarch use the Roman 
 tongue, and that he ought not thus to excuse himself 
 when such a burning question was awaiting settlement. 
 
 For two days the rival parties wrangled without 
 approaching any nearer to an agreement. Victor of 
 course lays all the blame on the Arians, but if any 
 Vandal account had been written, it is quite possible 
 that the Catholics would not seem altogether free from 
 fault. Their champion himself admits that they found 
 their opponents unexpectedly prepared for the theo- 
 logical debate, and it was undoubtedly their action 
 which brought the conference to a premature close. 
 For the Catholics withdrew after the second day, 
 protesting that their arguments were always met by 
 quibbles and that no justice could be expected from 
 such an assembly, and presented their defence in 
 written form to the king 1 . 
 
 1 This defence constitutes Book in. of the history of Victor Vitensis. 
 
134 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 So ended the great conference of 484 and with it 
 the chief hopes of toleration in Africa. No doubt it 
 had never been seriously intended to help the Catholics, 
 but at the same time it cannot be denied that Eugenius 
 did not prove himself a prudent leader. The meeting 
 was forced on him and he ought to have made the best 
 of it. He could not hope to derive any great benefit 
 from its decision, but he might have won the sympathy 
 of all but his most violent opponents. In this he failed 
 by giving vent to his righteous indignation at the 
 appointment of a partisan president and Cyrila's pro- 
 fessed ignorance of Latin, instead of accepting the ad- 
 verse conditions with a dignified protest. Whether 
 the Catholics shewed sufficient dialectical skill in main- 
 taining their doctrines cannot be ascertained, but, as 
 their opponents evidently supported their cause with 
 firmness and ability, their hasty withdrawal was an 
 undoubted blunder. Even if Hunneric had been sin- 
 cere in calling a conference, their action must have 
 seemed to him self-condemnatory; if he was only seek- 
 ing a pretext for persecution, it exactly suited his turn. 
 In the world at large, its condemnation by a biassed 
 judge would have done the Catholics no harm, but 
 by their withdrawal from the Council they abandoned 
 their sole chance of vindication in Africa. Though 
 Eugenius was forced as he was to appear at a conference 
 from which no justice oould be expected, he should 
 have realised the necessity of going on to the end, and 
 have borne with dignity what he could not avoid. 
 
 The Arians of course made the most of their 
 victory, and alleged that the Catholics had been 
 completely routed in argument and had declined to 
 
THE REIGN OF HUNNERIC. 135 
 
 continue the debate. Such a report as this was most 
 welcome to Hunneric, for it gave him a free hand. 
 He had not yet decided to exterminate the orthodox, 
 whose support he still hoped to secure for his political 
 schemes. The abortive conference could be used for 
 whichever purpose he desired. If he wished to apply 
 more pressure, he could quote the failure of the 
 orthodox ; if he wished to hold his hand, he could 
 profess to entertain honest doubts as to the truth of the 
 Arian creed. At the present juncture it was his policy 
 to persecute in accordance with the wishes of his Arian 
 subjects on the chance of overcoming the Catholics' 
 scruples. So once more religious oppression swept over 
 Africa. 
 
 All the Catholic bishops who had not come to the 
 conference and all who had hastened home again were 
 summoned to Carthage. On February 7 the churches 
 throughout the land had been closed and their 
 property handed over to the Arians ; and as Victor of 
 Vite says "the Vandals did not blush to issue against 
 us the law, which formerly our Christian emperors had 
 passed against them and other heretics for the honour 
 of the Catholic Church, adding many things of their 
 own as it pleased their tyrannical power 1 ." 
 
 In fact with grim humour Hunneric turned against 
 the Catholics the very weapons they had used against 
 the Donatists. He reissued the Theodosian edict of 392, 
 as one of the most terrible measures ever yet employed 
 against a religious body. For not only were the Catholic 
 priesthood proscribed, their churches and property con- 
 fiscated, their services and especially their baptisms and 
 1 Victor Vit., iv. 1. 
 
136 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 ordinations forbidden, but theythemselves were banished 
 from every town or inhabited place, were deprived of their 
 places if in the service of the Crown, lost the power of be- 
 quest and gift, and even in the end of holding property. 
 Every religious and civil right was taken from them 
 and they were at the mercy of every informer. The 
 most stringent regulations were made for the execution 
 of this edict ; every official was to fulfil its provisions to 
 the best of his power, and severe penalties were enacted 
 against those who did not rigidly enforce the edict. 
 In fact it was almost safer to be a Catholic than to be 
 a judge lenient towards them; the Catholic could at 
 most be reduced to poverty and exile, while the judge 
 was to be proscribed and put to death. A short period 
 of grace was however allowed to the Catholics. The 
 edict was issued on February 25th, 484, and was not to 
 come into force until June 1st, but after that date all 
 who had not become Arians were exposed to the full 
 fury of the storm 1 . 
 
 The Catholics seemed indeed beaten. Such a per- 
 secution as this had never before overtaken them, 
 either under pagan emperors or heretical kings. 
 Now for the first time did they realize the irre- 
 sistible power of the State, when applied to religious 
 matters with all the vigour of semi-civilised fanaticism. 
 
 However before these edicts, "feralia veneno toxi- 
 cato transversa 2 ," came into force, Hunneric shewed 
 how little he cared about the theological dispute. 
 His own projects alone urged him on, and the persecu- 
 tion of the Catholics was the outcome of political . 
 revenge, not of religious hate. The orthodox bishops, 
 1 Victor Vit., iv. 2. 2 Ibid., iv. 3. 
 
THE REIGN OF HUNNERIC. 137 
 
 who were still detained at Carthage, were suddenly 
 expelled from the city. Without any warning they were 
 ordered out of their temporary homes, leaving all their 
 property behind them ; and were refused permission to 
 use beasts of burden or to take as much as a change of 
 clothing with them. No one was to give them shelter 
 or help, and if anyone dared to relieve their distress, 
 he did so at the peril of his life and goods. 
 
 The bishops were in a terrible dilemma. If they 
 stayed near Carthage, the miseries of exposure and slow 
 starvation stared them in the face. If they returned 
 home, not only would they involve their churches and 
 their friends in their own ruin, but they themselves 
 would be haled violently back, and charged with a 
 cowardly shrinking from a hopeless contest. In their 
 extremity they adopted a desperate course and in 
 a body waited on the king to plead their cause. 
 Hunneric met them at the fishponds and for a time 
 listened to their prayers. They pointed out that they 
 had done no harm, but had assembled for the con- 
 ference according to his orders and they asked why 
 they were thus robbed and calumniated and driven 
 in hunger and nakedness away from their sees and 
 homes. However their words were of no avail; the 
 king as soon as he was tired of their complaints ordered 
 his escort to charge, and his horse-soldiers dispersed the 
 defenceless company of saintly old men. The majority 
 escaped their pursuers, but many, and especially the 
 infirm and aged, were knocked down and slain 1 . 
 
 Such treatment as this appeared to the king 
 certain to break the resolution of the oppressed bishops, 
 1 Victor Vit., iv. 3. 
 
138 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 and once more he endeavoured to gain an advantage in 
 the politics, for which he cared, at the expense of the 
 religion, with which he toyed. His victims were bidden 
 meet at the Temple of Memory to receive his final 
 offers. They were no longer to be required to accept 
 the Arian faith and they were to return in safety to 
 their sees, if only they would swear to obey a folded 
 charter, now presented to them. Some wished to 
 accept these terms; but two of their number, Hortula- 
 nus and Florentianus, stood firm, and pointed out the 
 impossibility of accepting "like irrational animals," a 
 document, the contents of which were hidden. Defeated 
 in his first attempt, Hunneric threw off all disguise 
 and set forth his demands plainly in a letter which 
 revealed his utter insincerity. Let them swear, said he, 
 to acknowledge his son Hilderic as his heir, or at least 
 let them promise not to write to the Emperor at Con- 
 stantinople nor to advise him to make any attempts to 
 recover Africa, in case of civil troubles. Such proposals 
 as these, divorced as they were from all theological points, 
 imposed a severe temptation upon the bishops. Their 
 opinion was divided ; some wished to accept the king's 
 proposals, the more prudent 1 to refuse. One party 
 feared the reproaches of posterity and the accusation 
 that they had lost their churches by their own folly ; 
 the other urged the want of all guarantee for the 
 king's good faith, and added the curious argument 
 that the required oath would be a contravention of our 
 Lord's command, " Swear not at all." 
 
 Seeing that there was no hope of a definite agree- 
 ment, the royal officials took down the names and 
 
 1 " astutiores," Victor Vit. 
 
THE REIGN OF HUNNERIC. 139 
 
 sees of each of the two parties and imprisoned all 
 alike. Unfortunately the long period of anxiety and 
 privation had done its work, and this new division of 
 opinion added mutual bitterness to the trials of the 
 Catholics. Those who had accepted the king's terms 
 declared that secular politics and not religion had 
 inspired the refusal of the others ; and they would find 
 time enough to repent when banished to Corsica to 
 cut wood for the fleet. The others replied that even if 
 compliance had brought restoration to their sees, they 
 would never have been allowed to resume their eccle- 
 siastical functions, but would have been degraded to 
 the condition of agricultural serfs 1 . In spite however 
 of these unfortunate but very natural disputes, nearly 
 all the bishops met the same fate. Of the 466 prelates 
 who assembled at the conference, 302 were banished 
 to the African deserts, 46 to Corsica, 88 perished under 
 the weight of their hardships, and 28 managed to 
 escape from their oppressors. Two are specially distin- 
 guished as having attained to the crown of martyrdom 
 and the glory of confessorship 2 . 
 
 The trials of Eugenius 3 have been recorded in fuller 
 detail than those of his fellow-sufferers. Tripoli was 
 the place of his exile where he became the mark of the 
 enmity of the Arian clergy. Antonius, the heretical 
 bishop of the district, proved himself a worse foe than 
 even Hunneric and rejoiced to witness the miseries of 
 the aged saint. The condition of Eugenius was bad 
 enough without any added hardship. He was allowed 
 only the coarsest food, and though delirious with fever 
 
 1 Victor Vit., iv. 3 — 5. 2 Notitia at end of Victor Vitensis. 
 
 3 Victor Vit., v. 11. 
 
140 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 and threatened by paralysis was forced to stretch 
 himself on the bare ground. Hearing of his illness 
 Antonius hastened to see him, and, forcing him to 
 drink the bitterest vinegar, laughed to hear his sense- 
 less wanderings. However, in spite of his enemies, the 
 health of Eugenius was restored and he lived to return 
 to his see under the milder rule of Gunthamund. 
 
 But the persecution was now no longer confined to 
 the Catholic bishops. Hunneric had tried to deal with 
 them all at once by collecting them at Carthage ; and 
 though a few of them seem to have been absent from 
 the conference or to have managed to return home 
 afterwards, these too were soon driven into exile or 
 obliged to flee. Thus Faustus was forced to leave his 
 see and dwell in the utmost poverty near his old church, 
 in order that his sufferings might be increased by the 
 scoffs of those who knew him in prosperity. For a 
 time he was allowed to live the self-denying life of a 
 monk ; but as the fame of his virtues gathered followers 
 round him, the Arians once more drove him forth to 
 find a safer hiding-place 1 . Rufinian, a bishop of 
 Byzacene, was more fortunate, for he escaped to Sicily 
 and there founded a monastery, the reputation of which 
 drew St Fulgentius across the sea 2 . 
 
 There is no need to go in detail through the horrors 
 of the general persecution. The last pages of Victor's 
 narrative are filled with atrocities, only relieved by the 
 heroism they called forth. Neither age nor sex was 
 spared ; ladies of noble rank were indeed the especial 
 objects of violence. Mutilations, shameful indignities, 
 tortures, murders were perpetrated on every side. Some 
 
 1 Vita Sit. Fulgentii, §§ 4, 8. 2 Ibid., § 13. 
 
THE REIGN OF HUNNERIC. 141 
 
 of the Catholics fled to the mountains and deserts, only 
 to find a death of slow starvation 1 . Others, roused to 
 desperation, cursed their persecutors and courted certain 
 doom ; but most were content to await in quiet the 
 sufferings which were too surely to be their lot 2 . 
 
 Two places stand out as the scene of the most syste- 
 matic oppression. At Tipasa, in Mauritania Caesariensis, 
 there were a large number of Catholics, who had probably 
 been protected by their remoteness from Carthage and 
 had never known the meaning of persecution. But 
 now an Arian bishop was sent out, and all the orthodox 
 who could fled to Spain. The few who remained refused 
 to hide their belief and openly continued to celebrate 
 the divine service, unmoved by either the threats or 
 the promises of the heretical prelate. He applied to 
 the king for aid, and a count was sent with directions to 
 gather the Catholics from all the province of Caesariensis 
 together and force them into submission, and even to 
 resort to the mutilation of the right hands and tongues 
 of those who remained obstinate. The savage orders 
 were carried out to the letter, and some of those who 
 suffered fled to Constantinople, where they astonished 
 and edified all by speaking plainly though without their 
 tongues 3 . 
 
 At Carthage, the head-quarters of both Arianism 
 
 1 Victor Vitensis, v. 15. 2 Ibid., v. 1 — 8. 
 
 3 This celebrated phenomenon evidently created a great sensation 
 at the time and has led to many discussions since. All the old 
 historians record it ; cf. Victor Vit., v. 6; Procopius, De Bella Vand. 
 i. 7 ; Marcellinus Comes, s.a., 484 ; Theophanes, s.a. 526, etc. For 
 a modern authority consult Dr Abbott who, in his Philomythus 
 (pp. 19, 20), discusses the claim Cardinal Newman makes to give the 
 event a miraculous character. 
 
142 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 and Catholicism, the persecution was particularly severe. 
 Eugenius had been already exiled and many of the 
 clergy had been slain, but once more Hunneric decided 
 to sanction that thoroughness of persecution which 
 distinguishes his policy from that of the other Vandal 
 kings. All the Catholic clergy of the city, to the 
 number of five hundred, were ordered into exile, and so 
 determined were the Arians to finally crush their rivals, 
 that not even the boy " readers " were allowed to remain 
 behind. At the same time the inmates of Catholic 
 monasteries and many of the laity were persecuted. 
 Seven monks from Capsa were brought to Carthage to 
 suffer martyrdom, and two merchants, who were both 
 called Frumentius, were put to death. But despite 
 all these barbarities the Catholics of the city were not 
 overawed. Some, it is true, apostatised, and some of 
 these were distinguished as persecutors, but the great 
 majority of the Catholics were moved to enthusiasm 
 by the sufferings of the martyrs. The seven monks were 
 visited in prison by crowds of sympathizers, and the 
 exiled clergy were sustained on their weary march by 
 friends, to whose ministrations the Vandals finally put 
 an end. However, the Arians adopted measures far more 
 likely to be effective than mere persecution, when they 
 tried to get hold of the children of Catholics in order to 
 bring them up in the unorthodox faith. The choristers, 
 who were going into exile with the clergy of Carthage, 
 were fetched back to prevent their education as 
 Catholics, and the abduction of children became the 
 regular practice of the Arians 1 - 
 
 There were, for all the fanaticism of the Vandals, 
 1 Victor Vit.,v. 9, 10, 14. 
 
THE EEIGN OF HUNNEEIC. 143 
 
 country districts, where the overwhelming numbers of 
 
 the Catholics made the effectual establishment of 
 
 heresy impossible. The wildest extravagance was 
 
 shewn in the Arian attempts to gain a footing here. 
 
 For, ignoring altogether the necessity of converting the 
 
 people to their tenets, and unable to force them to 
 
 attend their churches, they devoted all their attention 
 
 to baptizing according to the heretical rite. Led by a 
 
 bishop or priest, the Arians would surround a village 
 
 by night and arouse the inhabitants to be re-baptized. 
 
 Certificates of Arian baptism were required of all 
 
 travellers, or they were detained to submit to the rite, 
 
 and even men sleeping by the roadside were awakened 
 
 by consecrated water falling on their faces and an Arian 
 
 formula hurriedly muttered over them. While some of 
 
 the Catholics treated these tactics with the contempt 
 
 they deserved, the remorse of others and their strange 
 
 self-inflicted penances proved how accurately the 
 
 Vandals had estimated the great importance ascribed 
 
 by the majority of Africans to mere external ceremonies 1 . 
 
 Though nothing can palliate the indifference of 
 
 Hunneric to the atrocities committed in his kingdom, 
 
 he must not be classed among those misguided if honest 
 
 bigots, who have caused suffering for what they believed 
 
 to be the truth. In religious matters he was a Gallio, 
 
 and let things take their own course, because the 
 
 Catholics, whose support he had sought at the risk 
 
 of offending his own race, had spurned his offers 
 
 and thwarted his policy. He considered that their 
 
 sufferings might well regain for him the allegiance 
 
 of the Vandals. For all his callousness, the Catholics 
 
 1 Victor Vit., v. 13. 
 
144 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 did not regard him as their bitterest foe. Habetdeus, 
 bishop of Tamalla, oppressed by Antonius, the chief 
 persecutor of Eugenius, appealed to the king directly 
 for protection for the Church. Hunneric, in reply, did 
 not justify the persecution, but simply disclaimed 
 responsibility and referred his petitioner to the Arian 
 hierarchy. From them of course Habetdeus got no 
 satisfaction and in despair returned to exile, while 
 Antonius redoubled his persecutions, secure of the 
 indifference if not of the favour of the king 1 . 
 
 Once indeed Hunneric took an open part in the 
 atrocities. The emperor Zeno sent a legate, Uranius, 
 to remonstrate with the tyrant, and the king ordered 
 worse tortures to be prepared and publicly exhibited to 
 the ambassador as he passed along to the royal palace 2 . 
 But this barbarity was evidently for a political purpose 
 and was dictated by desire to flout the emperor rather 
 than by any feeling of bigotry. The cruelties of 
 his reign have for ever branded Hunneric with the 
 name of a heartless tyrant, and Victor of Vite did 
 not go beyond the truth when he called him "ilia 
 bestia 3 ." 
 
 Most happily for the Catholic Church the days of 
 its trials were as short as they were terrible, and its 
 special sufferings were perhaps alleviated by a fearful 
 calamity that befell all the land. In the last year of 
 Hunneric no rain fell and day after day the pitiless 
 sun beat down upon the hard-baked earth. Even the 
 rivers ceased to flow and all the grass was burnt up. 
 The harvests of corn, hay, and fruit alike failed, and 
 
 1 Victor Vii, v. 16. 2 Ibid., v. 7. 3 Ibid., v. 1. 
 
THE REIGN OF HUNNERIC. 145 
 
 man and beast were exposed to starvation. The whole 
 structure of society fell to pieces, agriculture and 
 commerce were neglected, and the country was scoured 
 in every direction in the vain search for food. Families 
 were scattered, slaves left their masters, and the richest 
 Vandals were reduced to the utmost want. And now 
 pestilence followed in the footsteps of famine. The 
 heaps of dead, neglected by the weakened survivors, 
 lay unburied and corrupted the air, and multitudes fell 
 sick and died on every side. In their despair the 
 starving people fled to Carthage, but Hunneric fearing 
 the infection of pestilence ordered the gates to be shut, 
 and fugitives refused admission fell dead by the road- 
 side on their way home. The two scourges of famine 
 and plague wrought such havoc, that populous villages 
 were swept away, and a deep silence pervaded the 
 untenanted houses 1 . 
 
 The horrors of this autumn must have distracted 
 the attention of the most virulent Arians from the 
 Catholics, and the sudden death 2 of the king, on 
 13 December, 484, secured them against the revival 
 of the persecution in its full vigour. This respite was 
 most opportune. Not even the African Church with 
 all its national earnestness could have for long with- 
 stood the terrible weapons brought against it. Not 
 only were the Catholics threatened with the most 
 barbarous tortures, they were also deprived of their 
 spiritual guides and exposed to every civil disability. 
 
 1 Victor Vit., v. 17. 
 
 a Prosper Tyro (Tkeodosio et Festo Coss) says he was eaten by 
 worms ; Isidorus Hispalensis (Hist. Vand. §79) and Victor Tunnunensis 
 (s.a. 478) say that he died the death of Arius. 
 
 H. 10 
 
146 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Active persecution alone might have revived their 
 enthusiasm, but the Vandals had now long realized 
 that it was dangerous to put a martyr to death- 
 Hunneric had directed against them the terrible grind- 
 ing oppression of the State, devised by the great 
 Theodosius, and it is almost impossible to believe that 
 any Church could have resisted such pressure for 
 long through respect for a doctrinal point however 
 important. Even if those Catholics, most distinguished 
 for their life and learning, had held to their faith, 
 the great mass of the laity would have drifted away. 
 Indeed many had already done so, and the Synod 
 at the Lateran of 487 or 488 was entirely concerned 
 with the terms upon which the lapsed should be 
 allowed to return 1 . These weaker brethren were of 
 every rank, and included bishops, priests and laymen 
 vowed to a religious life ; and two of the most bitter of 
 the Arian persecutors are said to have been renegades 
 from Catholicism 2 . 
 
 On the other hand it is evident that the persecu- 
 tion ended too soon to do any serious harm to the 
 Church. The enthusiasm of the people of Carthage 
 has already been mentioned, and it was not altogether 
 confined to the native Africans. Two Vandals left all 
 their wealth and accompanied the clergy of Carthage 
 into exile 3 , and in the days of Thrasamund there is 
 additional evidence that the Catholics had won the 
 admiration and respect of the more thoughtful of 
 their conquerors. Once more, too, the social and civil 
 importance of the orthodox comes out; though the 
 
 1 Hefele, History of Councils of Church, vol. iv. § 215. 
 5 Victor Vit., v. 9, 10. 3 Ibid , ; v 10 
 
THE REIGN OF HUNNERIC. 147 
 
 victims of Hunneric were not picked out like those of 
 Gaiseric, on account of their prominence and notoriety. 
 Two were connected with the king's own service, Dagila 
 the wife of the royal butler, and Victorian the inti- 
 mate friend and trusted adviser of Hunneric himself, 
 who held the responsible post of Proconsul of Carthage 1 . 
 With Catholics in such a position as this the Arians 
 must have realized that they were far indeed from 
 the time when the Church of Carthage would be no 
 more. 
 
 ' Victor Vit., v. 8, 4. 
 
 10—2 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 The Decline and Fall of the Vandals. 
 
 The keynote of the policy of Hunneric was the 
 desire to secure the succession of his son. For this he 
 had toiled, for this he had estranged the Vandals, and 
 for this he had persecuted the Catholics. But the 
 rules of inheritance, laid down by Gaiseric and approved 
 by the customs of the Teutonic race, prevailed and all 
 his efforts came to naught. Gunthamund, the son of 
 Genzo, was the eldest male of the royal stock, and to 
 him, as a matter of right, the throne belonged. 
 
 For twelve inglorious years the new king reigned, 
 but did little worth recording. He was not the man to 
 stem the tide of decay or to restore the prestige of his 
 people. The Moors steadily pressed forward, gaining 
 power in the southern frontiers, until even the heart of 
 Byzacene was not safe from their marauding expedi- 
 tions. St Fulgentius found Telepte, on the borders of 
 Byzacene and Numidia, exposed to their raids, and 
 Ididi, in Mauritania Caesariensis, regularly under their 
 control 1 . A bishop from the latter district was slain by 
 one of their plundering parties 2 . With such difficulties 
 
 1 Vita S. Fulgentii, §§ 9, 11. 2 C. I. L. vol. vm. 9286. 
 
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE VANDALS. 149 
 
 at home it was natural that the Vandals suffered 
 equally abroad. Theoderic, the new master of Italy, 
 was able to stipulate that their attacks on Sicily should 
 cease at the very moment he repudiated the tribute, 
 promised by Odoacer for that island 1 . 
 
 Though from the political standpoint the reign of 
 Gunthamund appears utterly inglorious, the position of 
 the Catholics was greatly improved. The kirjg himself 
 was not a persecutor, and only the circumstances of the 
 time prevented him from extending open toleration to 
 the Church. At first he had not a free hand ; his 
 succession was disputed, and if he had seemed less 
 zealous than his predecessor in the Arian cause, he 
 might have lost the support of the heretical hierarchy 
 and with it his kingdom. For three years he dared 
 not check the persecution, and for a time even greater 
 brutalities were perpetrated than in the days of 
 Hunneric 2 . 
 
 But once Gunthamund was securely seated on the 
 throne and safe from the attacks of his enemies, he 
 was able to consult his own wishes and shew mercy 
 to the Catholics. Yet he did nothing suddenly and 
 a change of policy was initiated with the greatest 
 caution. There was no general recall of the exiled 
 clergy, nor were the forfeited churches at once restored ; 
 but the return of Eugenius, who had won the 
 respect of all Africa — Vandal, orthodox and heretic 
 alike — was not prevented, and in 487, the Church of the 
 Holy Martyr Agileus and its burying-ground were given 
 
 1 Papencordt, Geschichte der Vandalen, p. 119. 
 
 2 Procopius, De Bella Vand., i. 7 ; Gelasius, Ep. 13 ; Theophanes, 
 Chron., s.a., 526. 
 
150 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 back to the Catholics of the metropolitan city. For 
 seven years little more was done and no general tolera- 
 tion was shewn. But on August 10, 494, on the 
 petition of Eugenius himself, all the other clergy were 
 recalled and the churches reopened, after they had 
 been closed for eleven years, six months and eight 
 days 1 . Although there had been seven years' delay 
 in the granting of a full measure of toleration, the 
 trend of events and public opinion had already fore- 
 shadowed the action of the king. So many Catholics, 
 who had lapsed or been rebaptized willingly or unwill- 
 ingly, had sought readmission to the Church, that 
 either in 487 or 488 Pope Felix I. had held a special 
 synod at the Lateran to consider the terms on which 
 the penitents could be received 2 . 
 
 Although the king himself does not seem to have 
 been indifferent to the rights of his orthodox subjects, 
 it was not easy to restrain the violence of the Arians. 
 St Fulgentius, the future Bishop of Ruspe, in this 
 reign entered upon his life of monastic devotion and 
 was a member of several religious communities in 
 different parts of the country. Wherever he went he 
 was exposed to the attacks of the local Arians or the 
 marauding Moors, and at last in despair he removed to 
 Ididi, in Mauritania, believing that even barbarians 
 were less dangerous neighbours than fanatical heretics. 
 Yet some of the Arians protected the Catholics, for when 
 Felix, a heretic priest, beat Fulgentius on the charge of 
 converting the Vandals, he was checked by an Arian 
 
 1 Prosper Tyro, vii., Theodosio et Festo Coss; Victor Tunn., s.a., 
 478. 
 
 2 Hefele, vol. iv. § 215. 
 
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE VANDALS. 151 
 
 bishop, and a few years later, the " primarius " of 
 Byzacene built him a monastery in a peaceful spot far 
 from the possibility of any molestation 1 . 
 
 The position of the Church under Gunthamund 
 may be summed up as a state of insecure toleration, 
 but the feeble support of the king was sufficient to 
 induce a people satiated with cruelty to permit the 
 restoration of the Catholic clergy. But on the part of 
 the Catholics the greatest care was necessary, as any 
 fanatical Arian could still incite the mob to repeat the 
 horrors of the days of Hunneric. For two years and 
 one month after the reopening of the churches, Guntha- 
 mund continued to reign ; but on 24 September, 496, 
 he died and was succeeded by Thrasamund, his brother*. 
 
 The history of the new reign marks a gradual 
 alteration in the character and position of the con- 
 querors of Africa. More than half a century had passed 
 since the fall of Carthage and the Vandals were now 
 accepted as regular members of the family of nations, 
 admitted to friendly intercourse, not only by the 
 invaders of Italy but by the Eastern emperors, all idea 
 of a reconquest of the old province seeming to have 
 been definitely abandoned by the Imperial government. 
 But more important than their altered relations with 
 other nations was the subtle change in the Vandal 
 character. The apparent security of their position and 
 their growing intercourse with nations more civilized 
 than themselves corrupted the primitive simplicity 
 of the Vandal conquerors. The desperate courage that 
 had inspired them to subdue Africa and harry the 
 
 1 Vita Sti. Fulg., §§ i, 8—11, 14. 
 
 ' Prosper Tyro, vn., Theodosio et Festo Coss. 
 
152 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 shores of the Mediterranean dwindled under the com- 
 bined influences of security and luxury, nor did the 
 Vandals in losing the virtues of barbarous warriors 
 gain the arts of peace. Under a veneer of civilization 
 they were as cruel as ever, but fraud was employed in 
 pursuit of their desires in the place of the ferocious 
 bravery of their ancestors. The policy of Thrasamund 
 shewed none of the straightforwardness for which his 
 race had once been celebrated. He tried to convert 
 the Catholics by promises rather than by violence ; and 
 proved himself incapable of recognising that advantages 
 gained by a treaty ought to carry with them their 
 attendant obligations. 
 
 Thrasamund indeed was the first Vandal monarch 
 to pay much attention to foreign alliances. Gaiseric 
 had occasionally urged the other invaders of the Empire 
 on to effect a diversion when he was in danger, and 
 both he and Hunneric, whilst never suffering outside 
 dictation, had permitted Imperial ambassadors to visit 
 Carthage. But now almost cordial relations were set 
 up with the court of Constantinople, and a matrimonial 
 alliance was contracted with the master of Italy. 
 The Eastern Emperor Anastasius negotiated several 
 treaties with Thrasamund, and doubtless Procopius is 
 only reflecting the popular feeling of the time when he 
 praises the Vandal king for his dignity and good looks 
 and the prudence and magnanimity of his rule 1 . 
 
 But, whatever were the relations between Con- 
 stantinople and Carthage, they had far less effect upon 
 the fortunes of Africa than the marriage of Thrasamund 
 to Amalafrida, the sister of Theoderic, who brought 
 1 Prooop., De Bello Vand., i. 7. 
 
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE VANDALS. 153 
 
 with her a body-guard of 5000 men, of whom 1000 were 
 picked Goths, whilst her dowry of Lilybseum gave the 
 Vandals a foothold once more in Sicily 1 . Thrasamund 
 proved an unsatisfactory ally, and received Gesalic, the 
 natural son of Alaric II., who was fleeing from his 
 brother-in-law. A vigorous protest reminded him of 
 his breach of faith and he was compelled to make ample 
 apologies 8 . 
 
 In spite of the claim now advanced by the Vandals 
 to a position in the community of states, they were really 
 growing daily weaker. No foreign alliances, no royal 
 interchange of presents could make up for the drain on 
 their strength in the south. The Moors still pressed on, 
 and in Tripoli the army defending the frontiers did 
 more harm to the Catholics than to the enemy. 
 Wherever they went they made the churches of the 
 orthodox stables for their flocks and herds, beat the 
 priests and forced them to perform menial services ; 
 but when they met Cabao, the local Berber chief, they 
 experienced a crushing defeat. Their conduct had not 
 been unobserved and their conqueror sent men to 
 follow on their track, with orders to try and repair the 
 damage they had done by cleaning the churches, re- 
 lighting the lamps, and distributing alms. Cabao was 
 not a Christian ; but, connecting the defeat of the 
 Vandals with their sacrilege, he hoped to gain the 
 favour of the God rejected by his enemies 3 . 
 
 Still more menacing to the Vandal power than 
 occasional border raids was the kingdom set up on 
 
 1 Procop., loe. cit. ; Theophanes, s.a., 526. 
 
 2 Cassiodorus, Var., v. 43, 4. 
 
 3 Procopius, loc. cit. 
 
154 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 their frontiers by Moors and disaffected coloni. In 508, 
 Masuna, a Berber chief, established an independent 
 state with a curious medley of institutions. The in- 
 fluence of Home prevailed so far that the language and 
 Imperial style were officially adopted, but the two races 
 composing the population of the state were to live 
 side by side under their own laws and magistrates. 
 Masgivin, prsefect of Sufar, ruled the Moors, Maximus, 
 procurator of Altava, governed the Romans 1 . Of the 
 later history of this curious federation nothing is known, 
 but it must have come to an end with the reconquest 
 of Africa by Justinian. However, this circumstance is 
 equally a testimony to the gradual decay of the Vandal 
 power. 
 
 In his religious as well as in his foreign policy 
 Thrasamund shewed the same divergence from the 
 ideas of his predecessors. The Vandal king no longer 
 sought to inspire fear by persecution, but preferred 
 to work on other motives. Little actual violence 
 mars his reign, his policy being to convert his 
 Catholic subjects by making Arianism a condition of 
 worldly success. With profound knowledge of men, 
 Thrasamund determined to ignore the existence of the 
 Church and to shut all avenues of promotion to those 
 who clung to the orthodox faith. If a Catholic for- 
 swore his creed, he was sure of large rewards and 
 rich offices, and if anyone incurred his displeasure, 
 adoption of Arianism extenuated every crime. But 
 for a time at least the Church was left unmolested 2 . 
 
 As, however, Thrasamund found this method of 
 
 1 C. I. L., vm. 9835 ; Boisaier, L'Afrique Romaine, vn. § 5. 
 J Procopius, I.e. 
 
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE VANDALS. 155 
 
 conversion abortive he ultimately reverted to the tra- 
 ditional policy of his predecessors. About 504 1 he 
 issued a decree that as bishops died their places were 
 not to be refilled. For a time the Church acquiesced 
 in the royal command ; but as its sees were one after 
 another left vacant its position became intolerable and 
 a general feeling of desperation arose. It was felt more 
 advisable to risk the outburst of royal fury by dis- 
 obedience than to permit the Church to die out by 
 acquiescence in his commands. The surviving bishops of 
 Byzacene accordingly met together, about the year 508, 
 and decided to fill up at once all empty sees; considering 
 that in any case the Catholics would be benefited by a 
 bold policy. If Thrasamund's wrath was by this time 
 appeased, the organization would be safely restored; 
 if the persecution was renewed, they would gladly 
 endure it, secure in their knowledge of the bracing 
 effect of adversity. 
 
 The resolution once taken was promptly carried 
 out. No diocese and no parish wished in such a matter 
 to seem to lag behind, and sometimes more haste than 
 discretion was shewn. Soon all Byzacene was filled 
 with newly ordained clergy and very few sees remained 
 vacant 2 . But one diocese was still pastorless and for 
 a most unusual cause. The men of Ruspe 3 had elected 
 the saintly Fulgentius as their bishop, but could not 
 
 1 For the dates of the decree and the exile of the bishops I follow 
 the chronology of Buinart, History of the Persecution of the Vandals, 
 xi. 3, and Hefele, Hist, of the Councils of the Church, rv. 221, but at 
 best they are very uncertain. 
 
 2 Vita S. Fulgentii, § 16. 
 
 3 Ruspe, not far from Syrtis Parva, 35° 1' lat. N., 11° 1' long. E. 
 
156 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 find him when they sought to consecrate him, for he, 
 preferring a life of monastic self-devotion to any office 
 however important, managed to escape their importu- 
 nities and hide himself away. Meanwhile an eager 
 candidate appeared on the scene. Felix, a deacon, had 
 none of the scruples of the great monk and did not 
 hesitate to try to secure consecration by the influence 
 of the procurator of the district, who was a friend of his 
 family. His efforts were unsuccessful, and as soon as 
 the retreat of Fulgentius was found he was forced to 
 become bishop, by the representations of Victor, the 
 primate of the province himself 1 . 
 
 At such a time as this consecration brought as 
 much danger as honour, and before long the new pre- 
 lates had to pay a heavy price for their elevation. 
 Thrasamund was not the man to tamely submit to 
 open disobedience, and as soon as the general con- 
 secration had taken place Victor was summoned to 
 Carthage to explain the action of the Church. No 
 defence that he could give satisfied the king, and a 
 decree of exile went forth against the new episcopate. 
 From Byzacene 60 bishops and many monks and clergy 
 were conveyed to Sardinia 2 , and there they were joined 
 by others from the rest of Africa, until 120 prelates 
 altogether were banished s . Though exiled they were not 
 otherwise ill-treated. They were not indeed supplied 
 
 » Vita S. Fulg., § 17. 2 Vita S. Fulg., §§ 16, 20. 
 
 3 The authorities are not agreed on the numbers of the exiles. 
 The author of the Vita Sancti Fulgentii gives the number from 
 Byzaeene as above. Victor of Tunno (s. a. 497) and Isidorus Hispal- 
 ensis {Hist. Vand. § 81) say 120, without mentioning their provinces. 
 Other authorities give 225 or 230, but 120 has the best support. 
 
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE VANDALS. 157 
 
 with food, and had to depend on the charity of Pope 
 Symmaehus, but they were left to employ them- 
 selves as they chose. With two of his fellow-sufferers 
 Fulgentius founded a monastery, and occupied himself 
 in answering the questions and dissolving the doubts 
 of many correspondents on theological points 1 . Besides 
 the exiles to Sardinia some may have been driven to 
 other places ; Eugenius was perhaps one of them. He 
 died in 505, soon after the active persecution began", 
 and is said to have ended his days at Vienne in Gaul 3 . 
 Towards the end of his reign Thrasamund's policy 
 towards the Catholics underwent another change. Per- 
 haps the needs of his foreign or domestic policy, perhaps 
 a sincere desire to ascertain the truth, impelled him to 
 summon Fulgentius, the most eminent of the exiles, to 
 Carthage to argue the doctrines of Catholicism with the 
 Arian divines. The conference did no good; and though 
 according to his biographer the great bishop evaded all 
 the traps laid for him by the king, he could not con- 
 vert his opponents and was sent back to Sardinia. 
 Still the account of the visit of Fulgentius to the 
 capital of the Vandals is very remarkable. He was 
 treated well and allowed to live in his own lodgings. 
 No restriction was placed on his preaching, and he is said 
 to have not only comforted the Catholics but to have 
 won over many of the unbelievers. When the time of his 
 departure came round Thrasamund, fearing a popular 
 demonstration, arranged that he should sail by night. 
 However, the elements defeated the royal plans, for the 
 wind veered round and carried the vessel back to land, 
 
 1 Vita S. Fulgentii, §§ 20, 26. 2 Victor Tnnn. , s.a., 505. 
 
 3 Gregory of TourB, Hist. Franc., n. 2. 
 
158 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 where great crowds had assembled to bid Fulgentius 
 God-speed 1 . No doubt the narrative is one-sided and 
 overcoloured ; but unless the whole story is rejected as 
 incredible, the remarkable fact stands out that in the 
 stronghold of the Vandals, under the eyes of an Arian 
 king, great multitudes of Catholics dared to collect and 
 defy the whole power of the State. Thrasamund tried 
 to defeat, not to suppress, their enthusiasm, and it is 
 clear that even eighty years of spasmodic persecution 
 had not made it safe for the Vandal monarchs to openly 
 brave the wrath of the Catholics, when roused. Such 
 is not the record of a declining Church. 
 
 On 25th of May, 523, died Thrasamund after a 
 reign of 26 years, 8 months and 6 days 2 . On his death- 
 bed he was full of misgiving for the fate of his kingdom, 
 as his successor Hilderic, son of Hunneric, no doubt in- 
 fluenced by the teachings of his mother Eudocia, was 
 known to favour the Catholics. To try to tie the 
 hands of his successor was therefore the last care of the 
 dying Thrasamund, and he made Hilderic swear a 
 solemn oath that when king he would not recall the 
 exiles or reopen their churches. As soon as he was 
 dead his plans came to nought. Hilderic, with the 
 subterfuge that formed a great part of his nature, 
 devised a means to break the spirit, while he kept the 
 letter of his oath. There was a short interval be- 
 tween the death of one king and the formal acknow- 
 ledgement of the next, during which the king elect would 
 have the supreme authority de facto but not de jure. 
 In this Hilderic saw his opportunity; while he wielded 
 
 1 Vita S. Fulg., §§ 21—5. 
 
 * Prosper Tyro, vn., Theodosio et Festo Coss. 
 
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE VANDALS. 159 
 
 the power of the king, but was not yet king, he issued 
 an edict restoring the banished clergy, proclaiming 
 religious toleration, and making Boniface bishop of 
 Carthage 1 . 
 
 Throughout his reign Hilderic continued to favour 
 the Catholics and the Church enjoyed perfect rest. 
 Boniface was consecrated in the Church of St Agileus, 
 the historic cathedral of Carthage, and the ecclesiastical 
 organization was restored. There was indeed urgent 
 need for reform after nigh a century of persecution, 
 during which period the Church had struggled for bare 
 existence, with her clergy exiled or slain, her monasteries 
 harried, and her prelates driven far away from their 
 sees. Much of the old organization had been destroyed 
 and some perhaps forgotten ; the rules of ecclesiastical 
 government were disordered, and two points in par- 
 ticular called for settlement. The boundaries of dioceses 
 and the respective rank of the diocesans needed regu- 
 lation, and the extent to which the episcopate could 
 claim authority over monks was a question fruitful 
 of many disputes. 
 
 No doubt while the persecution lasted, nice dis- 
 tinctions as to the districts under the charge of a 
 bishop had not been made, and the Catholics had been 
 willing to accept the ministrations of any prelate 
 without enquiring the exact limits of his diocese. But 
 now brighter days had dawned and such questions 
 assumed a real importance. At a provincial synod 
 at Junca, in Byzacene, in 523 or 524, Liberatus, the 
 primate of the province, complained of the encroach- 
 ments of Vincentius, bishop of Girba, in Tripoli ; while 
 
 1 Victor Tunn., s.a., 523 ; Isidor. Hispal., Hist. Vand., § 82. 
 
160 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 at the conference of all the African bishops at Carthage 
 in 525, Liberatus himself was rebuked for claiming part 
 of the proconsular province. 
 
 At Junca, the precedence of individual bishops was 
 also considered. Fulgentius was placed before a certain 
 Quodvultdeus ; but as this seriously annoyed the latter, 
 the Bishop of Ruspe got the decree altered at the 
 synod held at Sufes in the following year 1 - More 
 important was the decision of the precedence of the 
 episcopate of the various provinces made at the great 
 council of Carthage already mentioned. On February 5, 
 525, sixty bishops from every part of Africa met in 
 the sacristy of the Church of St Agileus under the 
 presidency of Boniface. The claims of Carthage to be 
 the premier see were first enforced, and it was then 
 decided that the bishops of the other provinces should 
 rank in the following order : Proconsularis, Numidia, 
 Byzacene. The omission of the names of Tripoli, 
 Caesariensis and Sitifensis, though representatives 
 were present from them, perhaps bears witness to the 
 encroachments of the Moors, and the loss of these 
 provinces to civilization and Christianity. 
 
 The second problem calling for solution was the 
 position of religious communities with regard to their 
 diocesan. The exile of so many clergy to the deserts, 
 and the resort of fugitives to inaccessible spots, had no 
 doubt caused a considerable development of African 
 monasticism, and the restored bishops wished to 
 have control of the monasteries within their dioceses. 
 Liberatus had thus come into collision with a certain 
 
 1 Vita S. Fulg., § 29. 
 
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE VANDALS. 161 
 
 Abbat Peter, and the matter was discussed both at 
 Junca and Carthage. The claims of the Primate of 
 Byzacene were defeated on geographical grounds alone ; 
 the monastery was not in Byzacene, and the appeal for 
 aid from that bishop was only due to the fact that the 
 see of Carthage was at that time vacant. But the 
 conference was not content with the decision of the 
 particular case, but passing on to consider the whole 
 question decreed that, as the religious communities 
 were composed of men from all parts of Africa, and 
 even of foreigners, the local diocesan was not to 
 have any right whatever to interfere in monastic 
 affairs 1 . 
 
 While the Church thus was able to set its house 
 in order, the reign of Hilderic was the most inglorious 
 the Yandals had yet seen. Their king proved by his 
 character how hard it is for even the most vigorous 
 race of barbarians to withstand the enervating effects 
 of a too luxurious civilization. His treatment of the 
 Catholics, the one meritorious act recorded of Hilderic, 
 revealed a lack of moral courage, apparent alike in his 
 foreign and domestic policy. As treacherous as he was 
 timid, the king, who dreaded the very name of war, 
 had no scruples to hinder him from resorting to acts of 
 secret violence. The defence of the kingdom was 
 handed over to Hoamer, the " Achilles of the Vandals," 
 but with no success. Antalas defeated the frontier 
 armies, and the Leucathae captured Leptis Magna and 
 Sabrata in Tripoli, and again invaded Byzacene 2 . 
 
 1 For these two Councils, see Hefele, Vol. iv. §§ 236, 238. 
 
 2 Pioeopias, De BeU. Vand.,i. 9; DeAedif., vi. 3; Theophanes, s.a. 
 526. 
 
 H. 11 
 
162 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 The Vandals viewed their humiliation with disgust. 
 Even if policy was in favour of cultivating the friend- 
 ship of Justinian, nothing could excuse in their eyes 
 the partiality shewn to the Catholics and the neglect 
 to guard the frontiers of the kingdom. Amalafrida, the 
 spirited widow of Thrasamund, took advantage of their 
 discontent, and headed a revolt soon after her husband's 
 death. Beaten at the battle of Capsa, she was thrown 
 into prison and, in 526, on the death of her powerful 
 brother, Theoderic, foully murdered. His successor, 
 Athalaric, the new king of the Goths in Italy, was 
 not the man to see his royal house insulted without 
 protest, and wrote to remonstrate with Hilderic. As 
 Africa was still thought to be too strong to be safely 
 attacked, no action followed the letter ; but the position 
 of the Vandal monarch was materially weakened and 
 he could expect no help from the Goths in the hour 
 of need 1 , which was soon destined to come upon 
 him. 
 
 When he had reigned eight years and a few days, 
 Gelimer, the nephew of Thrasamund, tired of his mild 
 and cowardly rule, raised an insurrection and ' made 
 himself king. Hilderic, with Hoamer and his brother, 
 Evagees, were cast into prison, and a reign of terror 
 ensued. Many of the great Vandal nobles were slain, 
 many lost their property, and the tyrant's rage included 
 even the members of his own family 2 . 
 
 Although it is nowhere recorded that Gelimer ill- 
 treated the Catholics, it is more than likely that he 
 
 1 Cassiodorus, Var. ep., ix. ; cf. Hodgkin's edition and notes. 
 
 2 Isidor. Hispal., Hist. Vand. , § 83 ; Prosper Tyro, loc. cit. ; Procbp., 
 Be Bell. Vand., i. 9. 
 
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE VANDALS. 163 
 
 did. He had attracted many Vandals to his side by 
 condemning Hilderic's friendship with Constantinople, 
 and an easy and popular means of proving his sincerity 
 would be a new persecution. 
 
 The usurper was not left long to enjoy his new 
 kingdom. Justinian, the great Emperor of the East, 
 on the pretext of avenging his ally, seized the op- 
 portunity to recover the important province of Africa 
 for the Empire. Twice he sent embassies to expostulate 
 with Gelimer, and as their only results were further 
 hardships for the prisoners, Belisarius was despatched 
 to conquer the land. He landed at Caput Vada in 
 September 533, captured Carthage within a fortnight, 
 and before the next spring was master of all Africa. 
 The Vandal domination had passed away for ever and 
 the Church had emerged from her days of bitter 
 trial. 
 
 For over a century Africa, cut off from the Roman 
 Empire, had been under the sway of barbarians, whose 
 Arianism made them doubly odious. Catholicism as 
 the creed of the conquered was proscribed as much for 
 political as for theological reasons. To be a Catholic was 
 to be the opponent of the Vandal regime, to be an Arian 
 to acquiesce at least in the power of the conquerors. 
 Yet although for a century the schemes of statesmen 
 and the hatred of theologians had sought to destroy the 
 Church, the resolution of the Catholics had withstood 
 all attacks and had completely foiled the hopes of the 
 heretics. The Catholics were not uprooted and the 
 Arians had not gained a foothold. Again and again 
 had wholesale proscriptions been ordered, again and 
 again had edicts been issued to degrade the Catholics, 
 
 11—2 
 
164 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 exile their clergy, close their churches, and confiscate 
 their property. The very frequency of the orders proves 
 their futility. Few of the Vandals themselves wished 
 for their execution. For what had they to gain by a 
 systematic persecution of the orthodox ? The vast mass 
 of the population were Catholics, and on Catholics 
 therefore the Vandals depended for their wealth, their 
 amusements, and even their administration. To a bar- 
 barian race, the complicated system of Roman govern- 
 ment was entirely new, and Gaiseric shewed himself a 
 true statesman by leaving the Civil Service in the 
 hands of the conquered Africans. The destruction of 
 the Catholics, therefore, meant the disruption of the 
 whole order of society, and could only have been 
 accomplished by the help of the Catholics themselves. 
 No doubt the Arian clergy as a whole hated the 
 orthodox, not, it must be confessed, unnaturally, if the 
 treatment of heretics within the Empire is remembered. 
 But even amongst them there were exceptions, and all 
 the efforts of the Vandal hierarchy were more fertile in 
 isolated barbarities than effectual proscriptions. 
 
 Most of the Vandal kings looked upon the rival 
 sects as mere pawns in the political game. Leaning on 
 the whole towards Arianism, none of them shewed any 
 deep theological conviction. Gaiseric saw the inherent 
 connection of Catholicism and Imperialism, and knew 
 that if the Vandals were to remain masters of Africa, 
 Arianism must be the dominant religion. But he was 
 content with that ; as long as the orthodox Church did 
 not try to make converts, or to assert its power, he did not 
 wish to destroy it. In fact as long as it existed, it was 
 a convenient hostage for the safety of his kingdom ; and, 
 
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE VANDALS. 165 
 
 when he did persecute, Gaiseric preferred to alarm the 
 Byzantine court by the execution of a single courtier, 
 rather than to weaken the Church by an indiscriminate 
 persecution of Catholic bishops. Hunneric alternately 
 favoured and persecuted Catholicism, as his policy de- 
 manded. Gunthamund recalled the exiles. Thrasamund 
 tried persuasion before violence. Hilderic was weakly in 
 favour of the Church and Gelimer, if he persecuted 
 orthodoxy, persecuted all Africa. In no case does it 
 appear that a Vandal king was filled with fanaticism or 
 perhaps any real religious conviction. 
 
 In fact the only period during which the Catholics 
 were in danger of extermination was the last few 
 months of Hunneric's reign. They had crossed his 
 policy and had to pay the penalty by being exposed to 
 the full fury of Arian hate and systematic proscription. 
 However, mercifully for the Church, the days of their 
 enemy were suddenly cut short and Gunthamund 
 befriended them as soon as he could. From his acces- 
 sion onwards the lot of the Church was much improved; 
 not indeed because it had made much progress in the 
 favour of the Vandals, but because the whole attitude 
 of conquerors and conquered had altered. The genera- 
 tion which had driven out Boniface had long passed 
 away, and to the contemporaries of Gunthamund and 
 Thrasamund the ravagings of the Mediterranean were 
 already a tradition. Luxury and civilization were 
 doing their work, and making tortures and exile more 
 and more repugnant to the indolent Vandals. From 
 the very first the conquerors had treated their domestic 
 slaves with some consideration, and as time went on 
 Vandal and African no doubt regarded each other as 
 
166 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 necessary to their own existence. With improved 
 social relations, religious toleration must have increased, 
 and the methods of the last great persecutor Thrasamund 
 betray a desire to avoid violence as much as possible. 
 
 The Vandal persecution had therefore failed, as 
 perhaps in any case it must have done, owing to 
 the immense majority of the Catholics over the 
 Arians. But still its effects were great. A Church 
 cannot be harassed for more than a century and be 
 deprived again and again of its leaders without 
 suffering greatly from disorganization and disorder. 
 As has already been said, the very boundaries of 
 sees and the precedence of bishops had been confused 
 and some friction occurred before they could be ar- 
 ranged. But of vital harm the Church had received 
 absolutely none. Some of its insincere members 
 had indeed fallen away and some of the faithful 
 had been forcibly rebaptized. On the other hand it 
 had gained some recruits from the ranks of its enemies. 
 But far more important was the spirit of enthusiastic 
 loyalty aroused by its sufferings and the determination 
 to keep unimpaired the Creed which had cost so dear. 
 In the height of the persecution crowds of Catholics 
 had dared to defy the Vandal kings, and with the 
 same devotion the Church of Africa henceforth with- 
 stood every unorthodox assault. As far as our scanty 
 records tell, from the time of the reconquest of the 
 Province no suspicion of heresy ever lighted on the 
 Carthaginian Church. This unique boast is no doubt 
 due to its century of resistance to the Arian attack. 
 
 Although the Catholics emerged from the Vandal 
 domination untainted by heresy, the Church did not 
 
THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE VANDALS. 167 
 
 escape the damage done to all the Province by a very 
 different foe. Never again did the Emperors rule over 
 all the old boundaries of Africa. Church and Province 
 alike lost ground by the resistless advance of the ter- 
 rible Moors. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 From Justinian to the Saracens. 
 
 Though the success of Belisarius was as decisive as 
 it was sudden, the capture of Carthage did not end the 
 troubles of Africa. The Vandals, it is true, disappeared, 
 but they left their legacy of mischief behind. For a 
 time Carthage recovered a semblance of its past glories, 
 and again saw its harbour crowded with the navies of 
 the world. For a time too the whole Province seemed 
 to shew marvellous recuperative powers, and with the 
 towns rebuilt under a reorganized government, seemed 
 destined to enjoy its old prosperity. 
 
 However, despite appearances, neither the efforts 
 of the Emperors nor the valour of their soldiers could 
 for long postpone the inevitable decay. The stability 
 of a country depends after all upon its internal resources 
 and its capital should be the apex and not the basis of 
 its power. With Roman Africa the reverse was the 
 case. All depended on the external resources of the 
 Empire and all places looked to Carthage as the source 
 of their prosperity. Had the body politic really been 
 sound, every village and hamlet in Africa would have 
 helped to swell the glories of the great city ; but as 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 169 
 
 things were, it was Carthage that had to provide 
 government and security for every part of the Province ; 
 and its luxury and magnificence hardly extended be- 
 yond its own gates. The country districts contributed 
 nothing to its real stability, but merely supplied it 
 with riches to squander. But though year by year 
 the Romans were driven back by the Moors and less 
 and less territory was held by the imperial forces, 
 to outsiders Africa seemed strong, for Carthage was 
 still magnificent. Nor was it till the city itself was 
 actually destroyed that men recognized that no effective 
 resistance could be offered to a determined foe by a 
 province dependent on a decadent empire, and trusting 
 only in its stores of accumulated wealth. 
 
 Although Africa had been regained for the Empire 
 with surprising ease, a period of the most terrible trial 
 ensued. For twelve years the struggle between Moor 
 and Roman, barbarism and civilization, paganism and 
 Christianity went on, and it was only in 546 that the 
 internecine strife sank into a chronic state of border 
 warfare. 
 
 The Vandals indeed gave little trouble after the 
 capture of Gelimer. Of the men, 160,000 were slain in 
 the two great victories of Belisarius 1 ; and the rest were 
 either drafted into the imperial army as auxiliaries, or 
 seeking refuge amongst the Moors ceased to exist as a 
 separate people. The women were still left and were 
 taken in marriage by the conquering soldiers, but the 
 Arian ecclesiastics were not easily got rid of. But 
 though these survivors at first caused some disturb- 
 ances, it was not long before they were swallowed up 
 1 Prooopius, Anecdota, xviii. 
 
170 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 in the mass of the provincials and within a generation 
 all trace of the former masters of Africa had completely 
 passed away. 
 
 The twelve years, which were to pass before the 
 Province was at rest, fall naturally into four well-marked 
 periods. In the first, from 534 to 535, the reconquest 
 of Africa is continued ; in the second, from 536 to 539, 
 the revolts of the army and the pacification of Numidia 
 call for all the energies of the provincial government ; in 
 the third, from 539 to 543, the work of reorganization 
 went rapidly forward under the strong rule of Solomon ; 
 while the fourth period, to 546, saw Africa given up to 
 desolation and tyranny 1 . 
 
 In Byzacene Solomon, who vigorously set himself to 
 drive back the Moors, met with complete success though 
 not without considerable loss, and on two occasions the 
 barbarians ravaged the entire province. Within a year, 
 however, of the recapture of Carthage the only Berbers 
 within the boundaries of the Eastern part of this 
 province were the friendly tribes of Antalas. In 
 Numidia, the imperial forces had a more chequered 
 career. A chief called Iabdas had securely established 
 himself upon the almost impregnable Aurasius, and 
 from there raided the plains at his pleasure, and in 
 particular destroyed Timgad. At his first attempt, 
 Solomon failed to capture this natural citadel and was 
 disabled from renewing his attack by a revolt in his 
 rear. 
 
 For in 536, the imperial army suddenly rose in 
 mutiny. The Boman legionaries had long been 
 
 1 The authority for this period of misrule is Procopius, De Bello 
 Vandalico, ii. 8-28. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 171 
 
 drawn from every nation within and even beyond the 
 borders of the Empire. Some had married Vandal 
 women and were stirred up by their wives, disgusted 
 at the loss of the estates which their countrymen 
 had long occupied in security; some were Arians and 
 were discontented at the proscription of their creed; 
 and the sudden appearance of 400 Vandals, who had 
 deserted from the imperial forces, in the mountains of 
 Aurasius and Mauritania, brought the disaffection to a 
 head. Two-thirds of the army threw off their allegi- 
 ance, drove Solomon from Africa, pillaged Carthage, 
 and retired to Numidia under a leader called Stutza. 
 Here they were joined by the Moors and the whole 
 country was once more ravaged, till Germanus attacked 
 and put the confederates to rout. In 539, Solomon 
 returned and at once set about the capture of Aurasius, 
 and this time attained his object 1 . The Moors were 
 driven out ; a permanent garrison was established and 
 Numidia at length had peace. 
 
 During the next four years the whole province was left 
 unharassed by raids, and Solomon undertook the much 
 needed work of reorganization. During the century of 
 Vandal domination much had been done which had 
 now to be altered and the Province had fallen into a 
 defenceless condition. As soon as the conquest was 
 complete, steps were taken to reimpose the land-tax, 
 
 1 Procop., De Bello Vand., ii. 18 — 21 ; see also C. I. L., vol. vm. 
 9738. In the mountains of Caesarea El. Mansour found this inscrip- 
 tion: "I am Solomon the Serdeghos (<tt parity bs). The people of the 
 town having revolted, the King sent me against them ; and God having 
 permitted me to conquer them, I have had this monument erected to 
 perpetuate my memory." Ibn Khaldoun (Slane), i. 234 ; ii. 539. 
 
172 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 and the lands given by Gaiseric to his followers were 
 seized for the imperial treasury. Both these measures 
 caused great discontent ; for the tax had been so long 
 remitted that its assessment was forgotten and the 
 army of Belisarius thought that the estates of the 
 "Vandals ought to be their perquisite. Moreover, the 
 levying of such taxes was the occasion of the greatest 
 oppression, and it may fairly be questioned whether the 
 African coloni were not in all but religious affairs better 
 off under the Vandal than the Imperial rule. 
 
 Far more beneficial to the whole Province were the 
 measures taken to secure its defence. The Vandals 
 had been unable to keep back the Moors, and, with 
 extreme shortsightedness, Gaiseric had prevented his 
 subjects from defending themselves by destroying the 
 fortifications of every town but Carthage. Conse- 
 quently, when the Moors overran the land, the wretched 
 border-towns had had to resist as best they could with 
 hasty barricades thrown up across the streets. Justi- 
 nian was however a mighty builder, and he set to work 
 at once to refortify his frontiers. The actual date of 
 his works is unrecorded, but it is unlikely that so good 
 a soldier as Solomon allowed this time of respite to slip 
 by without beginning at any rate fortifications against 
 the Moors. In Tripoli, Leptis Magna and Sabrata were 
 surrounded with a wall. In Proconsularis the defences 
 of Carthage were improved, Baga was refortified, and 
 the castle of Tucca was built. In Byzacene walls were 
 built at the capital Hadrumetum, Caputvada, Telepte, 
 Mamma and Cululis on the frontier, and the armed 
 camp of Aumetera was formed. In Numidia, Mount 
 Aurasius was strongly occupied, and Timgad and other 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 173 
 
 neighbouring cities were rebuilt; while in far-off Gades, 
 the castle of Septa was constructed. Besides these 
 military works many churches were erected in these 
 cities. At Carthage, public baths and the Maritime 
 Colonnade of the Forum, were built, while the monastery 
 of Mandracium, which towered above the harbour with 
 the strength of a fortress, bespoke the lordly ideas of 
 the emperor 1 . 
 
 No doubt such enormous buildings as these were 
 the work of many years, and they cannot have been 
 finished, when the peace of Africa was once more 
 broken. For four years the Moors had seemed to 
 accept the Imperial domination in comparative quiet. 
 If Solomon had been able to govern personally the 
 whole Province, all might have been well ; but in 
 543 the treachery of the young governor of Tripoli 
 alienated the friendly tribes. In a moment the south- 
 eastern districts were in a blaze, and all the dis- 
 contented united in one last effort to throw off the 
 Imperial yoke. Stutza and the few surviving Vandals 
 reappeared; even the Antalas turned against the 
 emperor, and many of the country people, disgusted 
 with the tyramiy and extortion of the new rule, were 
 willing to aid the insurgents. Byzacene was ravaged 
 far and wide, and Solomon was defeated and slain 
 by this formidable coalition. All Africa seemed about 
 to share the fate of the south-east, and in despair 
 those who could fled to Sicily or Constantinople. How- 
 ever, division soon sprang up amongst the rebels. One 
 upstart after another seized the supreme power, was 
 attacked and fell, and for three years the utmost 
 1 Procopius, De Aedif., vi. 3-6. 
 
174 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 confusion reigned. Carthage and the Province suffered 
 immense damage, and once more Byzacene was swept 
 by the Moors. However, in 546, John, the son of 
 Pappus, was sent out as Magister Militum, and by his 
 efforts the rebels were defeated and Africa recovered 
 for the Eastern Empire. 
 
 At length the sorely tried Province was at peace, 
 for though the borders were never safe, the interior 
 was on the whole unmolested for another century. 
 This long delayed and precarious peace came just 
 in time to save Africa from utter ruin. For the 
 century of barbarian rule and the twelve years of 
 internecine strife had both diminished and impover- 
 ished the population 1 . At the Vandal Conquest, a 
 large number of the inhabitants were slain or driven 
 abroad. During the Vandal domination, the emigra- 
 tion still went on. At the end of Hunneric's reign, 
 a terrible famine and plague slew thousands of all 
 ranks. The days of Hilderic and Gelimer were days of 
 disorder and civil strife, and in the twelve years that 
 followed the reconquest, according to Procopius, not less 
 than five millions perished 2 . Mr Hodgkin thus sums 
 the matter up nearly in the words of the great Greek 
 historian: "But from decade to decade, the fine country, 
 which had once owned the sway of the Vandals, sank 
 deeper into ruin. Many of the provincials fled into 
 Sicily and the other islands of the Mediterranean. The 
 traveller in passing through these regions, which had 
 once been most thickly peopled, now seldom met a 
 
 1 Procopius, De Bello Vand., ii. 28. 
 s Procopius, Anecdota, xviii. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 175 
 
 single wayfarer. Languishing under barbarian inroads, 
 Imperial misgovernment and iniquitous taxation, the 
 country was ripening fast for the time, when even 
 Saracen invasion should seem a relief from yet more 
 intolerable evils 1 ." 
 
 Although Africa had already received its death- 
 blow, it must not be supposed that its end came yet. 
 It had sustained irreparable injuries and it was subject 
 to a steady drain upon its strength, but despite all the 
 Province for more than a century seemed to recover its 
 old glories and to be almost as prosperous as it had 
 been before the Vandals. Under the great Justinian 
 the work of reorganization went on apace. 
 
 The whole civil and military administration of the 
 Province was set in order and brought into touch with 
 the necessities of the time. All Africa was divided 
 into seven provinces, Carthage, Byzacene, Tripoli and 
 Tingi 2 under Consulars, and Numidia, Mauritania and 
 Sardinia under Praesides. Over all was set the Prae- 
 torian Praefect, who from his capital of Carthage 
 exercised a general control. The army was stationed 
 along the frontier in four divisions, each under its own 
 Dux, in Tripoli, Byzacene, Numidia and Mauritania 
 Caesariensis, and strict orders were issued to push the 
 frontier back to what it had been before the invasion 
 of the Vandals 3 . 
 
 This was never done, and the mountainous region 
 
 1 Italy and Her Invaders, iv. 46. 
 
 2 Probably Tingi was a part of Africa only by geographical 
 accident. The mountains of Atlas shut it off from Carthage, and it 
 was really governed from Spain. 
 
 3 Cod. Justinian, i. 27, 1-2. 
 
176 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 between Sitifiensis and Gades was henceforth left to 
 the barbarian rule. In Caesariensis only the town of 
 Caesarea owned the Imperial sway and its communica- 
 tions with Carthage had to be carried on by sea; 
 outside its walls an independent Berber chief, Mastigas, 
 defied the power of Solomon 1 , and his successors were 
 never reduced to submission. On the other hand the 
 influence if not the arms of Rome made some pro- 
 gress in Tripoli. Certain Moorish tribes adopted 
 Christianity and were content to live at peace with the 
 Province ; but their name "Pacati" betrays how rare 
 it was for the Africans to find the Berbers well dis- 
 posed towards them 11 . 
 
 Though the whole of Africa was never reconquered, 
 most of the best lands were recovered. Proconsularis, 
 Byzacene, Numidia and parts of Tripoli and Sitifiensis 
 once more belonged to the Roman Empire; but Tingi- 
 tana and Caesariensis were cut off for ever from the 
 rule of Carthage. Still what had been reconquered was 
 held securely; its borders were comparatively safe and 
 the new fortifications and the strong frontier forces 
 kept the Province free from all but occasional maraud- 
 ing raids. 
 
 It had taken twelve years of hard work and con- 
 tinual war to set up the civil authority of the Empire, 
 but long before the Province had settled down to enjoy 
 the "Pax Romana," the Church had adjusted its own 
 affairs. As soon as the Vandal power had fallen, its 
 liberty of action had returned, and in spite of the wars 
 and rumours of wars that beset all Africa, as long as 
 
 1 Procop., De Bell. Vand., ii. 20. 
 
 2 Procop., De Aedif., vi. 3. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 177 
 
 Carthage was in the hands of the Imperial forces, the 
 Catholic bishops could go on with their task of reor- 
 ganization. For much needed attention in order to 
 restore the old order of things, and new problems caused 
 by the century of persecution were clamouring for solu- 
 tion. On the other hand the restoration of Catholicism 
 was less sudden than the restoration of Imperialism. 
 Although the Church could not recover its property 
 until Carthage and the Vandals had fallen, its lot had 
 been considerably alleviated for some years before the 
 arrival of Belisarius, and it may therefore be sup- 
 posed that by 534 its organization, in all its essential 
 branches, was fairly efficient 1 
 
 On the death of Boniface, bishop of Carthage, Repa- 
 ratus was elected, perhaps in 535 2 . The new Primate at 
 once set about the settlement of the two great questions, 
 to which the events of the last hundred years had given 
 rise. The proscription of Catholicism had caused many 
 Africans to embrace Arianism and had driven others to 
 monasteries and convents to escape the wrath of the 
 Vandals. Many of those who had joined the heretics 
 now wished to return to the ranks of the orthodox, and 
 some of the Arian clergy desired permission to retain 
 their cures on renouncing their errors. The religious 
 communities had during the days of persecution been 
 allowed to conduct their own affairs unchecked by any 
 episcopal supervision, and they now resisted the claims 
 of their diocesans to exert the same authority over 
 them as they had over the other Catholics within their 
 dioceses. It was most important to set these problems 
 
 1 Cf. Councils of Junca, Safes and Carthage in Chap. VI. 
 ' Victor Tumi. s.a. 535. 
 H. 12 
 
178 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 at rest. The ecclesiastical peace of Africa could never 
 be restored until some rule for the reception of Arian 
 penitents had been established, and until the relations 
 of the episcopate to the monasteries were finally ar- 
 ranged a constant source of friction must continue to 
 exist. 
 
 In order, therefore, to find a solution of the present 
 difficulties, Reparatus summoned a great council of 
 bishops to meet in the Basilica of Faustus in his 
 cathedral city 1 Two hundred and seventeen prelates 
 assembled and decided to submit the question of the 
 restoration of the Arians to Pope John II. A letter 
 was drawn up and despatched asking guidance in 
 this matter. Was, for example, every Arian to be 
 excluded as long as he lived from ordination to 
 the sacred offices ? Were the heretical clergy, even if 
 sincerely convinced of their errors, to be expelled from 
 their cures ? A much-needed warning was at the same 
 time sent to the Roman Church against indiscriminate 
 charity to fugitives from Africa, among whom were 
 many of the provincial clergy who preferred to live on 
 the charity of the Romans instead of facing the hard 
 work necessary to be done in Africa. It would be far 
 better for both Italy and Africa if only those travellers 
 who could shew letters of recommendation from their 
 bishop were received as sufferers for the orthodox 
 faith and that all others should be treated as heretics. 
 
 This letter deserves the highest praise. It proves 
 
 that the Church of Carthage had learnt much in its 
 
 time of trial. Too often had the African Christians in 
 
 their fanaticism done serious, if unintentional harm. 
 
 1 Moroelli, Africa Christiana, s.a. 535 ; Hefele, iv. § 245. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 179 
 
 But here we see the unexpectedly victorious behaving 
 with almost exaggerated kindliness towards their de- 
 feated foe. Carthage had fallen in 533 and Belisarius 
 was able safely to leave Africa in the following year. 
 But it was not till 535 that the Catholics took in 
 hand the question of the converted Arian clergy. 
 For nearly two years the latter must have been allowed 
 to enjoy their usurped positions and revenues, and no 
 undue haste can be laid to the charge of the Church 
 in dealing with them. When the Council was called 
 the utmost charity was shewn. With a kindly con- 
 fidence in the reality of their conversions, worthy 
 of Cyprian or Augustine, an attempt was made to 
 receive the heretics into the true fold on as easy 
 terms as was compatible with right. In a spirit of the 
 most Christian forgiveness, and with perhaps as much 
 political wisdom, the Pope is asked to countenance 
 the continuance wherever possible of the Arian clergy in 
 their posts. 
 
 When the envoy reached Rome John II. was 
 dead 1 ; but his successor Agapetus I. answered the 
 letter of the Council. No converted Arian might 
 aspire to any ecclesiastical office, even if he had been 
 "spotted with that plague" merely as a child; and 
 he could not allow heretical priests after reconciliation 
 to the Church to still hold their sacerdotal office. If, 
 however, the bishops wished to support these dispos- 
 sessed converts from the funds of the Church the Pope 
 made no objection. With regard to the warning against 
 ecclesiastical travellers from Africa, he would take care 
 
 1 27 May, 535. 
 
 12—2 
 
180 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 that the words of the Council were respected. Ten 
 years before the claim of the bishops to exercise 
 control over the monasteries within their dioceses had 
 caused some difficulty, and the Council held at Car- 
 thage in 525 had decided in favour of the independence 
 of religious houses. Once more now the question was 
 raised. Felician, the successor of the saintly Ful- 
 gentius in the see of Kuspe, desired to have a definition 
 of his rights over the monastery founded by his pre- 
 decessor, who though a bishop, had never ceased to be 
 a monk. Bishop Felix of Zactera in Numidia quoted 
 the decision of 525, and said that it still held good. 
 The local diocesan was not entitled to interfere or have 
 his cathedral within the walls of a monastery. He 
 must not ordain any monk without his superior's con- 
 sent, but if an abbat asked him to lay hands on one of 
 his monks, or to consecrate the chapel of a monastery, 
 he must not refuse him. Moreover, the monastic 
 priests were to be fully recognized, and their names 
 must be read out of the diptychs by the bishop at 
 divine service in the list of clergy ordained by him. 
 The diocesan too had no voice in the election of 
 abbats. In the first instance they were to be chosen 
 by the votes of all the community, but if there was a 
 dispute, an appeal was to be made, not to the local 
 bishop, but to other abbats, and from them to the 
 primate of the Province. Whether this was the final 
 decision of the Council or only the private opinion 
 of Felix is not known; but in all probability, as the 
 Church of Africa felt the greatest veneration for personal 
 sanctity, the religious communities were allowed com- 
 plete freedom from episcopal authority. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SAEACENS. 181 
 
 The only other business that the Council 1 is 
 recorded to have undertaken was the despatch of an 
 embassy to Justinian, claiming the restoration of all 
 rights and property taken from the Church by the 
 Vandals. Their petition met with a prompt response ; 
 the emperor ordered that all who could prove that the 
 lands of themselves or their ancestors to the third 
 generation had been taken from them by the invaders 
 should receive them back, and on August 1, 535, issued 
 a special edict to settle the position of the Church. All 
 the property of the Catholics seized by the Arians 
 was to be restored. No Arian, Donatist, or other 
 heretic was to celebrate the sacraments, or choose and 
 ordain bishops and clergy, and none but the orthodox 
 were to be employed by the State. Jews were forbidden 
 to have Christian slaves, to circumcise a catechumen, 
 or to set up synagogues. The Church of Carthage 
 was confirmed in its metropolitan rank and was 
 allowed the right of sanctuary for all save ravishers, 
 murderers, or the enemies of Christianity, and every- 
 thing dedicated to God was declared to be sacrosanct 2 . 
 This edict contained little that was new and restored 
 what was practically the state of things before the 
 Vandal Invasion. As before, the Arians and Donatists 
 were oppressed. The Catholics recovered their former 
 property, and the bishop of Carthage was once more 
 recognized as the Primate of the African Church. 
 
 As Byzacene had suffered most severely from the 
 ravages of the Moors, it was necessary for the 
 primate Datius to make use of the brief respite 
 
 1 Hefele, iv. § 248. 
 
 2 Justinian, Nov. 36, 37 ; Morcelli, Africa Christiana, s.a. 535. 
 
182 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 afforded by the success of Solomon in his second term of 
 office to reorganize the provincial Church. In 541, and 
 possibly in 540, councils were held for the restoration 
 of discipline. A letter was sent to Justinian asking him 
 to support the Church, to which a favourable response 
 was given, followed probably by a further interchange 
 of correspondence. Thus, in 542, Datius wrote an- 
 other letter, declaring that his efforts were directed to 
 the enforcement of the ancient ecclesiastical discipline 
 alone, and that he was not trying to increase its 
 stringency 1 . The extremely meagre records do not 
 narrate the measures of the primate of Byzacene or 
 their success ; but there cannot be any doubt that in 
 the terrible confusion that was so soon to overtake this 
 district the Church suffered very greatly, not only 
 by disorganization and want of discipline, but by an 
 actual loss of members. 
 
 The only mention by contemporary writers of the 
 attitude of the clergy towards the tyrants who ruled 
 Africa between 543 and 546, relates an unfortunate 
 incident concerning Reparatus, the bishop of Carthage. 
 The Primate hastened to meet Gontharis, on his cap- 
 turing the city, in order to make the peace of the 
 Church with him. The despot used the presence of the 
 bishop to induce Areobindus, the Magister Militum, to 
 come to the palace under pledge of safety, and then had 
 him treacherously slain 2 . To accuse Reparatus of any 
 conscious part in the murder is absurd, and he had to 
 pay, later on, the full price for his indiscretion in having 
 any dealings at all with a barbarous usurper. 
 
 Nothing else is known of the condition of the 
 1 Morcelli, a.a. 540—2. 2 Procop., De Bell. Vand., n. 28. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 183 
 
 Church during this terrible time of civil strife. It 
 was not directly endangered and only suffered with 
 the rest of the Province; but if Procopius does not 
 exaggerate, both Africa and the Church had now to 
 submit to a loss of numbers which nothing could repair. 
 A great crisis was overhanging the whole of Christen- 
 dom, and the action of the African Christians seems to 
 shew that, though for a time they were too busy with 
 their own affairs to attend to the troubles of other 
 communions, yet when they were at peace neither their 
 organization nor their orthodoxy had been hurt by the 
 twelve years of civil confusion. The famous dispute 
 about the Three Chapters began in 543 ; the Church of 
 Carthage could pay little attention until 549, but when 
 it did the Council of Chalcedon had no more fervent 
 champion. 
 
 Justinian, in his old age, had trespassed on the 
 domains of theology, and tried to amend the decisions of 
 the Council of Chalcedon (452), by anathematizing three 
 bishops, whom that assembly had declared orthodox. 
 Theoretically the emperor was perhaps right, but it was 
 dangerous to admit that there could be no finality in 
 theological disputes. Moreover, the clergy of the West 
 feared that any attack on the provisions of the Council 
 was really aimed at the creed of the Council itself, and 
 prepared to resist with might and main the decree of 
 the emperor. 
 
 Vigilius, the pope, led the opposition to the Imperial 
 decrees, and from the first had the sympathy of the 
 Church of Carthage. Legates from Africa, in 544, 
 strengthened his hand, and two of their number, Fa- 
 cundus, bishop of Hermiana, and Ferrandus, a deacon 
 
184 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 of Carthage, distinguished themselves as authors of 
 attacks upon Justinian 1 . Five years later, when the 
 struggle was growing more acute all over the West, 
 a council, held at Carthage, urged the Church to resist 
 the unjustifiable demands of the secular power and 
 argued that the whole authority of the Council of 
 Chalcedon was impugned, from a pedantic desire to 
 remedy one-third of its decrees a . In 550, another 
 Council of Carthage excommunicated Vigilius for yield- 
 ing to the Imperial commands. 
 
 In 551 the quarrel came to a head, and the pope, 
 for opposing Justinian, was banished to Chalcedon. It 
 is interesting to note that the august exile was accom- 
 panied in his exile by two African bishops, Verecundus 
 of Junca and Primasius of Adrumetum. Meanwhile 
 the primates of Proconsularis and Numidia, Eeparatus 
 and Firmus, had been summoned to Constantinople to 
 represent Africa. At the Fifth General Council both 
 worthily maintained the validity of the Three Chapters, 
 but afterwards Firmus was won over by the presents 
 of the emperor and was allowed to return home, only 
 to fall ill and die before he reached Africa. Reparatus 
 steadily resisted the Imperial arguments and bribes, 
 and it was determined to send him too into exile. 
 On an accusation, invented for the occasion, that he 
 was responsible for the murder of Areobindus six 
 years before, he was banished to the island of Euchaita, 
 where he died on the 7th of January, 563. 
 
 In his place, Primasius, his deacon apocrisiarius, 
 who must be distinguished from his namesake, the 
 bishop of Adrumetum, was, in reward for his compli- 
 1 Moroelli, s.a. 544. 2 jj,-^ S-a _ 54g_ 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 185 
 
 ancy, sent to Carthage by the emperor, as bishop. This 
 appointment was as uncanonical as it was unjust, and 
 was for a time repudiated by the other African bishops. 
 However, after some disturbances and bloodshed, in 
 •554, the force of circumstances caused the African 
 clergy to reconsider their position, and a council as- 
 sembled at Carthage consented to receive Primasius as 
 their primate, and to repeal the former decisions against 
 Vigilius. 
 
 For the next twelve years Africa was torn by 
 this senseless schism. For a time it seemed as though 
 Justinian would soon be victorious ; the clergy of 
 the Proconsular Province had accepted his views in 
 554, and their brethren of Numidia followed their 
 example in the following year. However, Byza- 
 cene was not yet convinced, and the diatribes of 
 Facundus of Hermiana raised a sturdy spirit of resist- 
 ance. To overcome this Justinian appointed, in 555, 
 Primasius of Adrumetum primate of the Province in 
 succession to Boethius, who had just died. Nothing 
 could be more unpopular amongst clergy and laity 
 alike than this choice. Not only was it an usurpation 
 of the selection of the Primate, but Primasius had 
 secured his appointment by unworthy means. First he 
 had supported Vigilius and had even been exiled to 
 the monastery of Acaetmetae 1 , but now he bought his 
 elevation by his apostasy. His conduct as primate 
 justified the worst fears of his old friends. He per- 
 secuted the opinion which he formerly upheld and 
 plundered those whom he oppressed. In the end he 
 
 1 Morcelli, s.a. 553. 
 
186 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 was found guilty of extortion, and made to disgorge 
 his ill-gotten gains and died a miserable death. 
 
 Meanwhile, the other Primasius, bishop of Carthage, 
 had been doing his best to win over all Africa to the 
 opinions of the emperor. He exiled Victor of Tunno 
 and Theodore of Cabarsussum, and, according to the 
 former, oppressed other opponents with scourges, im- 
 prisonments and exile. After eight years of confine- 
 ment these two champions of the Three Chapters were 
 summoned with bishops Musicus, Brumasius, Donatus, 
 and Chrysonius to Constantinople, to defend their views 
 before the emperor. Theodore died on the same day as 
 Justinian in the year 565. 
 
 With the death of the author of the famous edicts 
 the meaningless dispute of the Three Chapters came to 
 a fitting end. His successor, Justinus, never clearly 
 defined his views on the subject, and the opponents of 
 Justinian claimed that the victory lay with them. As 
 a matter of fact both sides had some cause to rejoice. 
 The emperor was able to point to the delegates from 
 Africa, who had signed the resolutions of the Fifth 
 (Ecumenical Synod at Constantinople, in May 553; 
 and the African supporters of the Chapters could urge 
 that they had prevented the Church of Spain from 
 accepting the Imperial edicts. But by 566 the whole 
 quarrel had sunk to its proper proportions, and no 
 breach in communion was caused, because Rome had, 
 and Africa and Spain had not, condemned the Three 
 Chapters 1 . 
 
 It is by no means clear that this uninteresting 
 
 1 For the whole of the quarrel see Victor of Tunno, s.a. 550-566 ; 
 Hefele, iv. §§ 260, 262 b, 267, 275, 277. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 187 
 
 quarrel had any permanent effect upon the destinies 
 of the Church in Africa. Victor of Tunno's evidence 
 about the persecutions of Primasius must be received 
 with a good deal of caution. He was himself a sufferer, 
 and undoubtedly, in one instance, party passion has so 
 overridden his judgment that he is able to praise a 
 certain Abbat Felix, of Gillitan, because he was an 
 opponent of Justinian, although he had been banished 
 to Sinope for his scandalous conduct, which had ruined 
 his monastery x - Moreover this period seems to have 
 been one of great literary activity in Africa; Primasius 
 of Adrumetum, Junillus of Utica, Victor of Matera, 
 Eugipius, abbat of the monastery of Lucullanae, and 
 Verecundus of Junca, all were noted authors. Most of 
 the subjects they chose were theological, but Victor of 
 Matera was a critic as well as a divine 2 . Foreigners, 
 as we are informed, began once more to look to Africa 
 as a seat of learning ; Cassiodorus, a Spanish abbat 
 sent to the superior of a monastery in Tripoli for com- 
 mentaries on the Epistles of St Paul, collected from 
 St Augustine's works, by Paul 3 , and later on we find that 
 the monks of Africa were held in such estimation, that 
 they were even summoned to preside over monasteries 
 at Rome. Thus Quoddeusvult was made abbat of the 
 Greater Monastery of the Blessed Apostle Peter 4 , and 
 Adrian was sent to England, with Theodore of Tarsus 5 . 
 This superiority was also maintained on doctrinal 
 points; in no part of the West were the clergy and 
 people so orthodox as in Africa. 
 
 1 Hefele, iv. § 260; Victor Tunn., s.a. 553; Moroelli, s.a. 557. 
 
 2 Moroelli, s.a. 556. 3 Hid. s.a. 561. 
 
 4 Ibid. B.a. 583. " Bede, Eccl. Hist., iv. 1. 
 
188 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 In the thirty years that followed the fall of the 
 Vandal power the African Church shewed no signs 
 within itself of approaching dissolution. In fact 
 it seemed to have recovered even more than it had 
 lost. Its organization enabled it to act at once with 
 the utmost decision. It had the courage of its 
 opinions. It dared to brave the anger of the emperor, 
 and if it yielded at last, it might have fairly pleaded 
 that there was nothing to be gained compared with the 
 losses it must sustain by holding out. A too rigid 
 opposition to pedantry even though in the right may 
 itself become pedantic in the end. Such persecutions 
 as there were, grievous as they may have been to the 
 sufferers, in no way affected the vitality of the Church. 
 At the end of the reign of Justinian, the African 
 Christians could with justice look forward to a long 
 and useful existence for the orthodox and well-organized 
 body of which they were members. It is to secular, 
 not religious matters that the historian must turn to 
 discover the reason of the extinction of the African 
 Church. 
 
 At this period two Imperial edicts were published 
 of vital importance alike to the social as to the political 
 welfare of the Province. The first affected the numbers 
 of the population, and especially of the agricultural 
 population. If Rome wished to retain her hold upon 
 Africa, it was all-important to maintain sufficient 
 people in the country districts to keep out the en- 
 croaching Moors. The Vandal occupation, the terrible 
 pestilence of the time of Hunneric, the years of 
 disorder after the reconquest had, as has been said, 
 reduced the population to an alarming extent, and 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 189 
 
 now a law of Justinian bid fair to extinguish it alto- 
 gether. By this edict the children of a freewoman 
 and a man bound to the soil were no longer to be serfs 
 themselves, but, taking their condition from their 
 mothers, were free to go where they pleased 1 . The 
 result was most prejudicial to agriculture, and Theo- 
 doras, the new prefect of Africa, was continually warned 
 of the impossibility of keeping any population on the 
 land. Farms were falling vacant in every direction, 
 and it was inevitable that all who could would flock to 
 the gay life of the towns rather than stay in the 
 country to glean such miserable existence as the tax- 
 gatherer left them. Justinus saw the truth of this, and 
 in 568 he altered the law in the same way as its author 
 had himself changed it in the case of Illyria 1 . The 
 children of an alliance between a freewoman and slave 
 should be personally free, but should be forbidden to 
 leave their native villages to seek work elsewhere. 
 Another edict of Justinus was of a much more question- 
 able character. By a law published on September 14, 
 566, marriages were made dissoluble by mutual con- 
 sent. When the fearfully lax state of the morals of the 
 Province is considered, it seems that this edict must 
 have had a most serious effect upon the sanctity of 
 the marriage vow. Yet strangely enough there is no 
 mention of any episcopal protests against the new law 2 . 
 It is, however, possible that a protest was made and 
 that all mention of it has been lost. The history of 
 the African province for the last two centuries before 
 the Saracen conquest has to be compiled from records 
 
 1 Justinian, Cod. xi. tit. 47, 1. 24; in Morcelli, s.a. 567. 
 * Cod. de fil. liberarum ; in Morcelli, s.a. 568. 
 
190 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 of the scantiest description. The tide of Mohammedan 
 invasion swept away nearly all that the Moorish raids 
 had left and the greater part of the history of the decline 
 of the Roman power is irrevocably lost. Still the little 
 that remains makes it clear that year by year the 
 boundaries of the Province continued to shrink. More 
 and more of Africa lapsed into barbarism, and when 
 civilization drew back the Church could no longer 
 retain its foothold. 
 
 For a time, indeed, the Roman prefects were able 
 to keep back the Moors, but the weakness of the 
 legions forced them to stoop to the payment of tribute. 
 An annual sum had to be given to Cutzinas, the chief 
 of a great Berber confederation, and as long as this 
 blackmail was paid the province enjoyed peace. But 
 in 563, with the most foolish treachery, the chief was 
 murdered as he came for his subsidy, and at once his 
 followers rose in revenge. All Africa was devastated, 
 and Marcian, the emperor's nephew, had to be hastily 
 sent to save the wretched Province 2 . For a time he 
 secured peace, but from 568 to 570 the Moors were 
 again able to ravage unchecked. In 568, they slew the 
 Prefect Theodore, in 569, Theoctistes, the Magister 
 Militum, and in 570 his successor Amabilis 3 . Moreover, 
 an independent kingdom, under Gasmulas, flourished 
 to the west of the Roman dominions. 
 
 Africa was at this time rescued from decay by the 
 arrival of a capable general and the publication of a 
 wise law. Gennadius, the new Magister Militum, slew 
 
 1 Morcelli, s.a. 566. 
 
 2 Theophanes, s.a. 555. 
 
 3 John Biclar. Chron., s.a. 3, 4, 5; Justin II. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 191 
 
 Gasmulas in 578, and drove the Moors back to their 
 old territories 1 ; while at the same time the gulf 
 between civilization and barbarism was partly bridged 
 over by an Imperial edict. Justinus had decreed, 
 as has already been said, that the children of a 
 freewoman, by a servile husband, should be free in 
 condition but bound to their native villages, and now 
 bishop Publianus of Carthage, induced Tiberius II. 
 to see that it was carried out. In consequence, 
 there grew up within the provincial borders a large 
 population, semi-Berber in blood, who formed a link 
 between the civilized Roman of the towns and the 
 wild barbarians of the hills. Though this new element 
 was not calculated to permanently strengthen the Pro- 
 vince, it staved off for a time the pressure of invasion, 
 and for the next 14 years Africa seems to have been at 
 peace 2 . 
 
 Of course all this anarchy, it has been our painful 
 task to relate, wrought harm to the Church. The few 
 records that are left speak of ruined monasteries and im- 
 poverished monks. Religious communities were broken 
 up, the pursuit of learning hindered, and a life of 
 peaceful devotion made an impossibility. In such cir- 
 cumstances, the exodus from Africa, which had begun 
 under the Vandals, still went on. Nunctus, with his 
 whole community, crossed to Spain, and won the favour 
 of even the Arian king, Leovigild, by his good works, 
 and was soon followed there by Donatus, with his 
 seventy monks 8 . 
 
 Meanwhile, the authority of the Church steadily 
 
 1 Ibid., s.a. 2; Tiberius II. 2 Moroelli, s.a. 568. 
 
 s Morcelli, s.a. 567, 569. 
 
192 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 increased, while the number of its members as steadily 
 declined. The Primate of Byzacene obtained the sole 
 right to try criminous clerks, and was promised that all 
 his petitions should be considered by the emperor himself. 
 Moreover, no clerk was to sail for Constantinople without 
 the permission of the Primate of his province 1 . Too 
 little is known of the ecclesiastical history of this time 
 to invest these privileges with much meaning, though 
 it may be conjectured that they point to some internal 
 troubles, which the Primate desired to allay by his own 
 methods. In the same way it is only possible to record 
 the following events; the circumstances which gave 
 them life have been completely forgotten. 
 
 About 566, Primasius, of Carthage, died and was 
 succeeded by Publianus. This prelate was followed by 
 Dominicus, whose consecration Morcelli puts in 584, 
 but on purely conjectural grounds. In 570, a Council 
 was held at Suffetula, of which we know nothing, save 
 that it dealt with questions of discipline ". 
 
 Once again for a few years it is possible to form 
 some idea of the condition of the African Church. 
 The light that is now thrown on the great Province is 
 not, it is true, very bright, and it but half illumines 
 much that is most interesting. Moreover, from its very 
 nature it is but a half light liable to distort while 
 it illuminates. Still it is a light, and in the utter 
 darkness that threatens to engulf the Church of 
 Carthage any illumination, however imperfect, is of the 
 utmost value. The correspondence of the great Pope 
 Gregory I. contains many letters on the ecclesiastical 
 
 1 Morcelli, s.a. 568. 
 
 2 Diet. Christian Antiquities, Art. ' Afrioan Councils.' 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 19.3 
 
 affairs of Africa, which are the greatest help in esti- 
 mating the state of the Province. They must, how- 
 ever, be read with caution and with due remembrance 
 of the essential conditions of a Papal correspondence. 
 
 It is only fair to keep in mind the very one-sided 
 nature of any communications passing between the Pope 
 and any one of the semi-independent communions 
 under his charge. In the ordinary course of events, 
 as long indeed as affairs were proceeding with custo- 
 mary smoothness, the letters between the Koman and 
 the other Churches would be confined to the courtesies 
 and formalities of everyday life. Only when there was 
 anything that called for reproof, when matters needed 
 the strong hand of correction and authority, would the 
 Pope be called to interfere. It is then only natural 
 that nearly all Gregory's correspondence with Africa 
 should be of the nature of reproofs. All commonplace 
 virtue, all regular daily self-sacrifice and holiness would 
 call forth no commendation from the supreme Pontiff. 
 For it was not his business to commend that which he 
 had the right to expect to be, and in all probability 
 was, the regular rule of existence of the African Church. 
 To reprove when there was need, to leave praises and 
 reward to his Master, was the duty of the Pope. To 
 infer that the state of African Christianity was wholly 
 bad, because nearly all Gregory's letters deal with 
 grave dangers and abuses, would be as unreasonable, as 
 it would be to judge of the state of a Church by a few 
 disciplinary enactments. It is far more important to 
 notice the confidence with which the distant Pope can 
 appeal to the organization of the African Church to 
 correct those abuses which demanded his care. 
 
 h. 13 
 
194 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 There was, indeed, great need of external authority 
 to criticize the African Church at this time. Not 
 only was there a dangerous outburst of Donatism, but 
 the morality of the episcopate and clergy left much 
 to be desired. To the mind of the great ecclesiastical 
 statesman the cause of these evils was a dangerous 
 lack of discipline, and Gregory attempted to reform 
 the internal organization of the Church by making the 
 Papal authority to be more directly felt. 
 
 The principal crimes attributed to the African 
 Church were simony and avarice. Mere boys were 
 admitted to the lower ranks of the clergy, and bribes 
 were offered to procure the ordination of men of loose 
 morals. The peculiar diocesan system of Africa had 
 been always liable to abuse, and once more complaints 
 were heard of the encroachments of a bishop upon the 
 see of another. In Numidia, Valentio had seized 
 certain parishes belonging to Crisconius, and had 
 refused to restore them for fifteen years 1 . 
 
 In all this Gregory saw the need of a stricter dis- 
 cipline. He was especially suspicious of the traditional 
 mode by which bishops reached the Provincial Primacy. 
 It seemed to his practical mind absurd to entrust the 
 exacting and responsible duties of an archbishop to 
 whichever prelate happened to have been consecrated 
 for the greatest length of time. Such a prelate would 
 almost certainly be advanced in years ; he might often 
 hold an unimportant or inaccessible see ; and mere 
 seniority was no guarantee of his moral or intellectual 
 fitness. Gennadius, the Praetorian Prefect, was there- 
 fore asked to see that the Primate of Numidia should 
 1 Gregory I., Ep. vra. 28. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 195 
 
 be selected solely according to the requirements of the 
 office. An archbishop ought to be distinguished for 
 personal holiness and intellectual force, and his diocese 
 ought to be in a place convenient for resisting the 
 Donatists. Practical as this advice was, it found small 
 favour in the eyes of the Numidian bishops; their 
 conservative instincts rebelled against an alteration 
 of an immemorial custom, and they at once despatched 
 a vigorous protest to Gregory. The Pope yielded to 
 this unanimous expression of opinion on the part of the 
 local Church. In a letter addressed to all the bishops 
 of the Province he withdrew his opposition to all 
 well-established customs, permitting the appointment 
 of the Primates and all other matters to continue 
 as before, as long as it was clearly understood that 
 no Donatist should benefit through the blind working 
 of an illogical principle 1 . 
 
 Foiled in his attempt to reorganize the African 
 Church on a more satisfactory basis, Gregory did his 
 best to keep it in order by the despatch of confidential 
 agents and the cooperation of the secular officers. In 
 Gennadius, the Praetorian Prefect, and Innocent, his 
 successor, the Pope found invaluable assistants. To 
 the former he expressed his desires concerning the 
 appointment of primates, and commended Hilarus, one 
 of his deputies 2 ; he was moreover invited to help the 
 Council of Numidia to suppress heresy 3 , and took some 
 part in the accusation of Bishop Paullus'. Innocent 
 had been the friend of Gregory before he went to 
 Carthage and joined with the bishop of that city in 
 
 1 Ep. i. 74, 77. 
 
 2 Ep. i. 74. 
 
 3 Ep. iv. 7. 
 
 " Ep. vi. 63. 
 
 
 13 
 
196 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 calling the attention of the Pope to the condition of 
 the Sardinians \ 
 
 More important, however, than these Roman officials 
 were the two ecclesiastics, who acted almost as though 
 they were the Papal legates in Africa. Hilarus was 
 sent from Italy to be the overseer of the estates or patri- 
 mony of the Church, and to regulate the distribution 
 of alms to the poor 2 . Columbus was a bishop of Nu- 
 midia, who seems to have derived his importance rather 
 from Gregory's confidence and esteem than from holding 
 any particular official position ; it may well be that the 
 Pope had this prelate in his mind when he attempted 
 to change the method of appointing to the Primacy. 
 These two men were in truth the pillars of the influence 
 of Rome in Africa. Again and again does Gregory refer 
 difficult questions to their decision. If a bishop is ac- 
 cused of heinous crime, if there is a suspicion of heresy, 
 if anyone is charged with simony, these men are bidden 
 call a council and bring the matter to an end. Columbus 
 especially acted as the papal representative, and he 
 was associated with Victor, Primate of Numidia, in the 
 cases of Bishop Paullus, of Bishop Valentio and of 
 Paullinus, bishop of Tigisis. He was asked, too, to 
 take the initiative in settling the dispute between 
 Bishop Victor and his deacon Donadeus, and he was 
 recommended to Adeodatus, another Primate of Nu- 
 midia, as an adviser whose words should carry as much 
 weight as those of the Pope himself 3 . 
 
 Unfortunately there were grave objections to this 
 method of exercising control. Carthage had always 
 
 1 Ep. x. 37—8. 2 Ep. i. 75—6. 
 
 3 Ep. iv. 34—5; vm. 28; xn. 28—9; xn. 8; in. 49. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 197 
 
 been jealous of the interference of Rome, and in the 
 time of Aurelius the twentieth synod of Carthage had 
 declared that the Pope had no jurisdiction over the 
 African Church 1 . Since then circumstances had weak- 
 ened its independence. The long years of bondage 
 under the Vandals had both disorganized the Church 
 in Africa, and had prevented it from finding remedies 
 for the needs of the time. The help of Rome was 
 therefore gladly accepted without any constitutional 
 questions being raised. Leo the Great addressed a 
 letter of reproof to the bishops of Mauritania. Felix, 
 in 487 or 488, assembled a synod at the Lateran about 
 the return of Catholics, guilty of having lapsed into 
 Arianism, at which hardly a tenth of those present 
 had come from Africa. The synod of Carthage, in. 
 535, appealed to John II. upon the same point. But 
 now circumstances were altered and the African epis- 
 copate seemed inclined to resist outside interference. 
 
 Gregory's criticism of the appointment of primates 
 had already caused irritation, casting, as it did, a slur 
 upon the zeal and organization of the African episcopate, 
 and this irritation was still further increased by the 
 means adopted by the Pope to ensure good govern- 
 ment. It cannot, for instance, have been pleasant for 
 Adeodatus to be advised to follow the counsel of 
 Columbus; and no doubt the other bishops looked 
 askance at the man who was continually called upon 
 to hear the complaints against his colleagues 2 . 
 
 Gregory's own views on the matter are clear enough. 
 As the successor of St Peter, he thought himself 
 
 1 Hefele, § 120—2—5, vol. n. p. 462, etc. 
 
 2 Gregory I., Ep. vii. 2. 
 
198 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 entitled to interfere whenever he saw the necessity, and 
 to hear the appeals of all who had reasonable grounds 
 for applying to him. For a time these claims bred 
 some ill-feeling with Dominicus of Carthage; but peace 
 was soon restored, and the Pope won his point. Rome 
 was, he asserted, the mother-church of Africa, and was 
 therefore entitled to the utmost respect 1 . Columbus 
 he tried to comfort for his unpopularity by urging the 
 duty of a bishop to support the Papal authority, and 
 by claiming that no man, however exalted, can escape 
 the strictures of Rome if he breaks the laws of God 
 and His Church 2 . 
 
 To maintain a position like this, and to enforce the 
 right of intervention, required a man of exceptional 
 strength. But Gregory was exceptionally strong, and 
 he was able not only to exercise, but even to increase 
 the power of the Papal See. He appears to have 
 encouraged and welcomed the frequent appeals made 
 to Rome, and bade Gennadius to take care that any 
 bishops who were dissatisfied with the Numidian Synod 
 of 591 should be allowed to proceed freely to Rome 5 , 
 and in half-a-dozen other cases matters were referred to 
 Gregory's decision. The deacons Vincentius and Feli- 
 cissimus accuse Bishop Argentius of Lamiga, of Dona- 
 tism and simony 4 ; the clergy of Pudentia are alarmed 
 in the like tendencies in Bishop Maximianus 5 ; the 
 priest Adeodatus, and the deacon Donadeus, declare 
 themselves wrongly deprived of their offices 6 ; all alike 
 carry their complaints to Gregory, who remits their 
 
 1 Ep. viii. 33. 
 
 2 Ep. vii. 2 ; ix. 58—9. 3 Ep. i. 74. * Ep. i. 84. 
 6 Ep. ii. 48. « Ep. iv. 13 ; xn. 8. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 199 
 
 causes to his agents, Columbus or Hilarus, for investi- 
 gation and redress. 
 
 The most interesting of all these appeals is that of 
 the Abbat Cumquodeus, who reported a complete col- 
 lapse of monastic discipline. All over Africa monks were 
 leaving their cells and wandering through the country, 
 regardless of their vows and rules. As the bishops, 
 who had always regarded the monasteries with jealousy, 
 rather aided than checked this laxity, much harm was 
 done to religion and good order. In any country such 
 a state of affairs must have caused grave scandal ; but 
 through the peculiarities of the national character it 
 was especially dangerous in Africa. From the first 
 individuals were honoured there for their asceticism and 
 personal piety at the expense of the authority of the 
 entire Church, and consequently ambition instead of 
 a true vocation had led many to assume the monastic 
 vows. Some through an evanescent disgust with the 
 things of this world had forsworn for ever not only its 
 pleasures but its duties; others through a desire for 
 mere temporal advantages had entered the cloister; 
 and it was these who now seized the opportunity to 
 desert their monasteries and wander about the Province. 
 Too frequently the monastic garb was assumed as a 
 cloak for secret vice, and the liberty of the saints claimed 
 as an excuse for a licentious life. The danger was at 
 once appreciated by Gregory, and he urged Dominicus 
 of Carthage to save such an important part of the 
 Church's system from the discredit which had fallen 
 upon it 1 . 
 
 1 Ep. vii. 35.. 
 
200 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 The circumstances of the time made it most neces- 
 sary to check any outburst of popular fanaticism. In 
 the western and less civilized districts of Africa Dona- 
 tism had reappeared. Nothing seems to have been 
 heard of it from the invasion of the Vandals till the 
 days of Gregory, and there is some difficulty in explain- 
 ing its sudden activity after a slumber of a hundred 
 and seventy years. Evidently the measures of St 
 Augustine had not done more than break the power 
 of the schism in Proconsularis and Byzacene, for the 
 storm of the Vandal invasion had burst on the Province 
 before he could drive it out from all Africa. It has been 
 shewn that there is some reason to suppose that Dona- 
 tism appealed more to the Libyan than the Eoman 
 population, and it is probable that when the schismatics 
 of the plains were coerced or induced to return to the 
 Catholic fold, the less civilized members of the sect had 
 retreated to the inaccessible mountain ranges of Numi- 
 dia and Mauritania. Here, out of reach of either the 
 Arian invaders or the restored Catholics, they had 
 lingered for nearly two hundred years, maintaining 
 their own orders, and professing their peculiar tenets. 
 In their increased strength at the close of the sixth 
 century may perhaps be seen a sign of the growing 
 feebleness of the Eoman hold upon the interior of the 
 Province. As the Imperial influence diminished, that 
 of the Moors increased, until at length the form of 
 faith which appealed most to the Libyan mind began 
 to undermine the power of the Catholic Church. 
 
 For, as far as can be judged from the letters 1 of 
 
 1 The letters of Gregory dealing with Donatism are : i. 74, 77, 84 ; 
 n. 48, 37; iv. 7, 34—5; v. 5; vi. 37, 63—5; vn. 2. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 201 
 
 Gregory, the impulse towards Donatism came rather 
 from the laity than the clergy. The schism in the 
 beginning had arisen on a question of the ordination 
 of bishops ; now it is revived by the forcing or bribing 
 of the Numidian and Mauritanian prelates to ordain 
 clergy, acceptable to the people. The movement was 
 a popular one and the ecclesiastical authorities were 
 unable or unwilling to resist it. As it gathered 
 strength, it increased in violence, and in spite of 
 their proscription by the laws of both Church and 
 State, the Donatists steadily drove out the Catholics. 
 Bishops were bribed to consecrate schismatics ; ortho- 
 dox clergy were expelled from their cures ; rebaptism 
 became a common practice, and even men, who had 
 taken the vows of religion, allowed their sons, their 
 slaves and dependents to be contaminated by a repe- 
 tition of this sacrament. Argentius, bishop of Lamiga 1 
 and Maximianus of Pudentia 2 , were accused of accepting 
 bribes in favour of the Donatist clergy. Bishop Paullus 3 
 was said to be slack in opposing the schismatics, and 
 even the secular governors Gennadius and Pantaleon* 
 were suspected of feeling no great desire to see them 
 crushed out. 
 
 In truth, Numidia and Mauritania seemed to be 
 slipping from the grasp of the Catholics. Far away 
 from Carthage and with a Libyan population, there was 
 real fear that they would follow their own course, and 
 perhaps desert the doctrines as they had the practice of 
 the main body of the Church. The brighter services 
 of the Donatists 6 and their excessive veneration for 
 
 1 Ep. i. 84. 2 Ep. ii. 48. 3 Ep. vi. 63—5; vn. 2. 
 
 4 Ep. iv. 34—5. 6 Ep. i. 119. 
 
202 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 personal piety powerfully attracted the half-civilised 
 mountaineers of the borders. Moreover, there was little 
 to check them, and their changed attitude towards the 
 Catholics made them the more dangerous foes. In the 
 fourth and fifth centuries the Donatists had set up 
 a distinct organization, and Donatist and Catholic 
 bishops existed side by side in the same city. In the 
 sixth century the Donatists remained in the Church, 
 and tried to mould the existing machinery to their 
 own pattern. Where once they would have formed 
 a Separate body, they were now content to be a party, 
 and unfortunately they were the party which possessed 
 the popular support. 
 
 Gregory hardly knew where to look for help. The 
 danger was, it is true, confined to the west, but the 
 very freedom of Proconsularis and Byzacene from con- 
 tamination had perils of its own. Dominicus, of 
 Carthage, was inclined to too vigorous measures. At 
 a synod, held in 594 \ the council of Proconsularis 
 declared that all who were lukewarm in resisting the 
 schism must lose their goods and their offices, and 
 even included bishops in their decree. Gregory was 
 alarmed at this severity, and felt that it was unjust 
 and impolitic. The other Primates would think a slur 
 was cast on their zeal and might be inclined to resent 
 the attitude of Proconsularis, and thus the decree might 
 do more to perpetuate than to abate the schism. 
 
 But, if the eastern prelates were too eager, the 
 
 western were too slack. The Council of Numidia was 
 
 not to be trusted. Bitter quarrels divided it, and its 
 
 decisions on many points were contrary to the canons 
 
 1 Ep. v. 5. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 203 
 
 of the Church and the traditions of the Fathers 1 . It 
 was, moreover, with the best intentions hard to get to 
 the truth of the business. If Paullus was accused of 
 Donatism, he replied it was because of his zeal for the 
 Church. If Gennadius accused Paullus, it was said 
 that he did it to shield himself. On all sides were 
 recriminations, and it was clear that the Church was 
 full of internal divisions. In this crisis Gregory could 
 rely on Columbus alone, and it was to him that he 
 always turned. He urged him again and again to 
 make vigorous enquiries, and he bade him resist the evil 
 with all his might, while it was yet small and could be 
 comparatively easily put down. 
 
 It is impossible to estimate how far the efforts of 
 Gregory and Columbus met with success. It is most 
 unlikely that they really crushed the Donatists, but 
 they perhaps checked them for the time. The Pope's 
 later letters contain no reference to them at all, and no 
 more is heard of them in Africa; but when more than a 
 century later the Saracens drove the Christians of the 
 Province to seek refuge in Europe, Gregory II. had to 
 warn the bishops of Germany against African fugitives, 
 tainted with Donatism and Manichaeism 2 . It is probable 
 then that the schismatics still lingered on in their moun- 
 tain homes, and while Proconsularis and Byzacene, and 
 even the more fertile parts of Numidia, were altogether 
 Catholic, in the frontier districts Donatism only dis- 
 appeared with African Christianity itself. 
 
 From other ecclesiastical troubles Africa seems to 
 have been almost free. Morcelli, indeed, supposes that 
 the Arians, expelled from Spain by the edicts of 
 1 Gregory I., Ep. iv. 7. 2 Gregory II., Ep. 124. 
 
204 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Reccaredus, came to Africa 1 ; but of this there is no 
 evidence, and the difficulties of the land journey from 
 Tingitana to Carthage would counteract the actual 
 geographical nearness of the Province to Spain. On 
 the other hand, Gregory's letter to John of Scyllace 
 shews that Manichaeism still lurked in Africa 2 , and 
 a scandal connected with the Primate Crementius, of 
 which no details are extant, threatened a schism in 
 Byzacene 3 . Still, with the exception of Numidia and 
 Mauritania, ecclesiastical Africa seems to have been in 
 a flourishing condition in the days of Gregory the 
 Great. The Church indeed, was even able to extend her 
 boundaries ; for Gennadius, when he conquered a Berber 
 tribe, did his best to convert it as well. He also shewed 
 his interest in the Church by trying to repopulate some 
 of its lands, which had suffered through the raids of 
 the Moors 4 . 
 
 For, whatever might be the ecclesiastical condition 
 of the Province, its political state was growing steadily 
 worse. In 593, the Moors once more devastated all 
 Proconsularis. They drove Gennadius into Carthage 
 and forced him to promise all the gold of the city as 
 a ransom. They celebrated their victory by a feast, 
 thus giving the Romans their opportunity. As they 
 lay, overcome with wine and sleep, the garrison 
 opened the gates by night, sallied forth, and inflicted 
 enormous loss upon the besieging force 6 . Though the 
 Province was thus for a time secure from the Moors, it 
 had now to meet with a more terrible and resistless foe. 
 
 1 Morcelli, s.a. 589. 5 Ep. n. 37. 
 
 3 Epp. ix. 58—9 ; xn. 32. ■» Ep. i. 75. 
 
 B Morcelli, s.a. 593. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 205 
 
 In 599 and 600 the whole western world was visited 
 by a fearful pestilence, and Africa had to bear its full 
 share of the calamity 1 . Moreover, to the horrors of 
 war and pestilence, the horrors of misgovernment 
 were added. In many places the Roman officials, 
 protected by unjust judges, were guilty of the greatest 
 violence and in particular aroused the anger of Gregory 
 by extorting the tribute twice from the heavily taxed 
 people 2 . 
 
 Dark though the condition of Africa was, it would 
 be wrong to suppose that at this time it was worse 
 off than the rest of the remains of the Roman 
 Empire. All through the civilized world horrors 
 had become the commonplaces of life. Misgovern- 
 ment and barbarian invasions, wars, pestilence and 
 famine united to make this epoch one of the most 
 miserable in human history. To the eyes of contem- 
 poraries the Province of Africa appeared one of the 
 most favoured districts of the earth, and, in truth, 
 it really played no unimportant part in the seventh 
 century. 
 
 In 600, the Emperor Maurice called upon Africa for 
 help for Italy against the Lombards with a fleet 3 - In 
 609, Heraclius, the Prefect of the Province, rose against 
 Phocas the usurper, and at the earnest request of the 
 Senate seized the throne of Constantinople in his 
 stead 4 . But the Persians were now attacking the 
 Imperial city and had even advanced to within sight 
 
 1 Gregory I., Ep. ix. 123 ; x. 63. a Bp. xi. 5. 
 
 s MorceUi, s.a. 600. 
 
 4 Theophanes, s.a. 600—1 ; Nioephorus in Brev. init. ; Zonares, 
 Ann. xrv. 14. 
 
206 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 of its walls. Heraclius looked round for a refuge, and 
 none seemed to him so safe as the province over which 
 he had ruled. Outwardly, at least, it appeared to 
 flourish and its desert frontiers promised to protect it 
 from all attack from the east. Heraclius therefore 
 decided to remove his seat of government to Carthage 
 and was only prevented from doing so by the force of 
 circumstances. Twice he tried to go, and once he had 
 even embarked his regalia; but the entreaties, and 
 perhaps the threats of the people of Constantinople 
 compelled him to abandon his scheme *. At this time 
 in fact Africa, reduced as it was in size, exposed to 
 barbarian raids, subject to terrible pestilences, was the 
 safest part of the Roman Empire. In 619, it was the 
 only province not overrun by barbarian hordes 2 . 
 
 One more glimpse of the African Church is vouch- 
 safed to us before its records close for ever. Already 
 the list of the bishops of Carthage has failed. It is 
 not likely that Dominicus long outlived Gregory, but 
 the date of his death is unknown, and there is no 
 mention of any other Primates until the rise of Mono- 
 thelitism. The history of this heresy shews that, in 
 639, a certain Fortunatus was bishop of Carthage, and 
 that he was succeeded by Victor, on 16th July, 646. 
 
 The attitude of Africa towards the Monothelites ° 
 proves that the Church maintained her organization, 
 and could act with vigour until a very few years before 
 
 1 Morcelli, s.a. 615, 617 ; Nicephorus Chron. Brev. s.a. 617 : 
 Chron. Paaehale, s.a. 645. 
 
 2 Morcelli, s.a. 619. 
 
 3 For attitude of Africa towards Monothelitism, see Hefele, 
 §§ 303—4 ; Theophaues, s.a. 621. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 207 
 
 its end finally came. The celebrated Ecthesis of the 
 Patriarch Sergius was published in 639, and despatched 
 to all the Churches. From the very first Africa repu- 
 diated the heresy, for as the Prefect Gregory was 
 shewing the Monothelite manifesto to Fortunatus of 
 Carthage and the other bishops, Maximus, abbat of 
 Chrysopolis, arrived and warned them against the 
 doctrines therein enunciated. His efforts were success- 
 ful, and none of the African prelates were convinced by 
 the Ecthesis with one notable exception; Fortunatus 
 himself accepted the new teaching and declared him- 
 self a Monothelite 1 . His influence prevented Procon- 
 sularis from taking any steps against the heresy; but in 
 all the other provinces the Church formally repudiated 
 the false doctrines. Columbus, Primate of Numidia, 
 Stephen of Byzacene, and Reparatus of Mauritania 
 called together their synods and condemned the Ecthe- 
 sis and its supporters ; and a common letter was drawn 
 up and sent to Paul of Constantinople, expressing the 
 detestation in which the African Churches held the 
 heresy. It is interesting to notice that this letter was 
 not sent direct, because " Africa had been brought into 
 a certain suspicion at Constantinople by certain ma- 
 levolent people," and that it expressed submission to 
 the Papal See. 
 
 Stephen of Byzacene also wrote to the Emperor 
 Constans II. in the name of "cancti Africae sacerdotes" 
 urging him on to stronger measures against the heretics, 
 and a second letter to Paul of Constantinople set forth 
 the surprise of the Churches that he had not yet 
 
 1 Morcelli, s.a. 639. 
 
208 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 annulled the Ecthesis, and declared the orthodoxy of 
 Africa. 
 
 Meanwhile the heresiarch Pyrrhus visited Africa 
 and tried to make converts there 1 . He was confronted 
 by the Abbat Maximus and met with no success. 
 A public disputation between the two champions 
 was held before the Prefect Gregory, probably in 
 the year 645. The Monothelites were completely 
 defeated, and forced to confess their errors ; conqueror 
 and conquered went to Rome, where Pyrrhus made a 
 public recantation, only to return in a few weeks to 
 his errors 2 . 
 
 Once more the provincial synods anathematized 
 Monothelitism, with the exception of Proconsularis, 
 where Fortunatus was still Primate. Even here the 
 Church was orthodox, and Gulosus, bishop of Pupit, on 
 his own responsibility summoned a convention of his 
 sixty-seven colleagues to join the other provinces in their 
 condemnation of heresy. However, the days of Fortu- 
 natus were numbered ; on July 16, 646, he was deposed, 
 and Victor was consecrated to the see of Carthage in 
 his place 8 . The new Primate wrote to the emperor 
 Theodore I. to vindicate his own orthodoxy and to urge 
 the adoption of vigorous measures against the heretics. 
 Whatever the cloud between Constantinople and Car- 
 thage was, it had not yet been dissipated ; Victor gives 
 it as his reason for not writing directly to the Patriarch 
 and asks that his letter may be forwarded through the 
 Papal responsarii. 
 
 1 Moroelli, s.a. 642. 2 Moroelli, s.a. 645. 
 
 3 Moroelli, s.a. 646. 
 
FROM JUSTINIAN TO THE SARACENS. 209 
 
 So ends all that we know of the assault of Mono- 
 thelitism upon Africa. It clearly was not successful, 
 but whether it gained a foothold at all, whether any 
 besides Fortunatus were deceived by it, how far the 
 orthodox bishops were able to stamp it out, there 
 is nothing to shew. But it is plain that the heart 
 of African Christianity is still sound. The organi- 
 zation is still complete and can even bear an unusual 
 strain. The convention under Gulosus was no doubt 
 unconstitutional but very necessary, and the deposition 
 of the Primate was an act requiring both courage and 
 unanimity. As far as can now be seen, the career of 
 Monothelitism in Africa betrayed no weakness in the 
 armour of the Church. 
 
 With the consecration of Victor the ecclesiastical 
 history of the Province practically closes. Two more 
 facts can indeed be gleaned, but they are isolated and 
 unimportant. At a council against the Monothelites 
 held at the Lateran in 648, one African bishop, Victori- 
 anus of Uzalis in Proconsularis, was present \ A letter 
 of Pope Martin I. in 650, addressed " Electa spirituali 
 consensu Gatholicae Garthaginiensium Ecclesiae," etc., 
 seems to shew that Victor was dead, and his successor 
 not yet appointed 2 . 
 
 From this time onwards until the Saracen conquest 
 was complete, the records of the Church in Africa are 
 a blank. It has been said that the fate of Monotheli- 
 tism in the Province is uncertain; and there is nothing 
 to tell of the future of the Donatists or the state of the 
 monks. For fifty years before the fall of Carthage 
 
 1 Morcelli, s.a. 648. a Moreelli, s.a. 650. 
 
 H. 14 
 
210 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 unfathomable darkness overspreads the church life of 
 Africa, and the ecclesiastical historian can only try to 
 piece together from the scanty secular history of the 
 times the probable fate that befell the Church during 
 the miseries of the Saracen conquest. 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 The end of African Christianity. 
 
 The stand of the African Church against the Mono- 
 thelites is to all intents and purposes the last thing we 
 know about its history. It is true that the Church 
 as an organization existed for another century, and 
 that for nearly nine hundred years after the Saracen 
 conquest there were still Christians in Africa, who 
 professed to represent the Church of St Cyprian and 
 St Augustine, but for all that hardly anything is now 
 known of these last thousand years, and it is plain that, 
 though the Church of Carthage was not dead, it was 
 no longer able to take an active share in the life of 
 Western Christendom, or to extend its influence in 
 its own country. In fact from the beginning of the 
 seventh century the African Churches were in a mori- 
 bund condition, and though they managed to cling to 
 life until nearly the end of the sixteenth century, it 
 was with so feeble a hold that from the fall of Carthage, 
 in 698, no one would have reckoned them amongst the 
 number of living communions. 
 
 Still the story of these last centuries would be 
 most interesting, and an account of the failure of the 
 
 14—2 
 
212 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 ecclesiastical organization, and an explanation of the 
 marvellous vitality of the Faith, would be of the 
 utmost importance, if it were possible to supply them. 
 Nothing is known of the fortunes of the Church 
 during the Saracen conquest, and the glimpses we 
 get of the African Christians afterwards are sufficient 
 only to record, not to explain their survival. The 
 ecclesiastical historian can indeed merely examine the 
 secular events of the Mohammedan invasion, and try 
 to see how they influenced the Church, and then rest 
 content with collecting the isolated facts that tell of 
 the struggling existence of Christianity under Moslem, 
 rule. 
 
 In 646 the Roman power in Africa entered upon 
 the last stage of its history. The Province, once the 
 fairest and most fertile of all the imperial dominions, 
 was for more than half a century to be given up to 
 every form of misery and desolation, and then to pass 
 away from the influence of Christianity and civilization 
 into a bondage from which it is even now not entirely 
 freed. The story of these dismal fifty years opens appro- 
 priately with the treachery of the governor of Africa. 
 For some time the Prefect Gregory had been planning 
 a revolt against the Emperor Constans II.; but per- 
 haps dread of the Saracens, who had conquered Alex- 
 andria in 641, made him pause before cutting himself 
 off from his most powerful protector. However, in 
 646 the standard of rebellion was raised, and Gregory 
 declared himself the independent ruler of Africa 1 . 
 
 Little is known of the nature of this revolt. 
 Carthage was, indeed, still held for the emperors by 
 1 Theophanes, s.a. 638. 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 213 
 
 a small number of Christians, and the usurper esta- 
 blished his power at Suffetula in Byzacene, or, as it is 
 called by the Arabian historians, Sbeltla. The choice 
 of an inland capital and the large number of his forces 
 seem to shew that Gregory had succeeded in gaining 
 the support of the Berber tribes against the imperial 
 power. The Saracens, indeed, assert that his authority 
 extended from Tangiers to Tripoli ; but no doubt this 
 is an exaggeration, caused by ignorance of the facts and 
 desire to magnify a defeated enemy 1 . 
 
 The usurper had not long to enjoy his ill-gotten 
 power. Even before he revolted the Mohammedans 
 had begun to attack Africa, and the first expedition 
 was quickly followed by others. In 642 Amrou-ben- 
 el-Assi had plundered Fezzan and Tripoli 2 , and five 
 years later a second raid was made. The Caliph 
 Othman-ben-Offan despatched Abd-Allah-ben-Abou- 
 Sark with nearly 12,000 troops 3 against Sbe"itla. Gregory 
 raised an equal force, and met the invaders at Acouba. 
 For several days a fierce contest raged without either 
 side gaining any advantage, but at length reinforce- 
 ments under Abd-AUah-ben-Zob&r arrived for the 
 Saracens, and the Christians, worn out by continuous 
 fighting, were routed in all directions. Gregory himself 
 was slain, and Africa was left defenceless before the in- 
 vaders 4 . 
 
 i Ibn Khaldoun (Slane's transl.), i. 208—9; En Noweiri, I. 317; 
 El K'Airouani, p. 39, etc., El Hakem. 
 
 2 Ibn Khaldoun, I. 302 ; En Noweiri, I. 313 ; El K'Airouani, 36, 
 etc. 
 
 3 En Noweiri (i. 314 — 5) gives the Saracen forces as only 20,000; 
 but this is very unlikely. 
 
 4 Theophanes, s.a. 639. 
 
214 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 In spite of this signal victory the Mohammedans 
 did not yet think of making a permanent conquest. 
 Satisfied with the great booty which they had found 
 at Sbeltla, after pushing their ravages as far as Gafca 
 and Mermadjenna, that is to say through all Byzacene 
 and some part of Numidia, they consented to be bought 
 off for 300 kintars of gold. For fourteen months, how- 
 ever, they remained in Africa, and the Province lay 
 helpless before them ; they imposed an annual tribute, 
 which Habakia was left behind to collect, but with 
 neither arms nor authority to enforce 1 . 
 
 Meanwhile the Emperor Constans II. looked on 
 with short-sighted indifference. Was not Gregory a 
 rebel? Had not Africa revolted? What did the suffer- 
 ings of provincials matter to him as long as they paid 
 their regular tribute ? So an imperial agent Aulima 
 was despatched, and the miserable Africans were ex- 
 pected to contribute to the treasuries of both Greeks 
 and Saracens. However, Habakia, seeing his own 
 gains endangered, drove this new governor out, and 
 allowed the Greeks to choose Eleutherion as an in- 
 dependent ruler for themselves 2 . 
 
 For the next twenty years Africa enjoyed rest 
 from Saracen invasions, as the domestic politics of the 
 Mohammedans occupied all their attention, and they 
 had no time to enlarge their conquests, until the 
 assassination of AH in 661 decided the quarrels of 
 the Kharedjites and the Koreishites in favour of the 
 former. Most unfortunately for the Africans victory 
 inclined to the more fanatical party, in whose eyes the 
 
 1 Ibn Khaldoun, t. 110, n. 225 ; En Noweiri, i. 314, 324. 
 
 2 En Noweiri, p. 324. 
 
THK END OF AFEICAN CHRISTIANITY. 215 
 
 extension of the dominions of Islam was an act of the 
 greatest piety 1 . Perhaps even now the Province, de- 
 fended as it was by the frontier deserts, might have 
 successfully resisted invaders, if only the needs of the 
 time had been recognized. But no necessity could 
 force the Africans into union ; the twenty years of 
 respite were wasted, and, when the storm broke again, 
 Christians and heathen, Greeks and Moors, were as 
 much divided as they had ever been. 
 
 The advance of the Saracens was resumed in 661. 
 Benzert, the ancient Hippo Diarrhytus, was ravaged by 
 their fleet under Moavuiah-ibn-Hodaidj. Another raid 
 in 663 swept over Tripoli. A third reached the heart 
 of Byzacene and captured Djeloula, the ancient ' oppi- 
 dum Usaletaneum,' the miserable inhabitants of which 
 were butchered or enslaved. At length the Emperor 
 Constans II. was roused to take some feeble steps to 
 save the wretched province, and by his orders a small 
 fleet under Nicephorus sailed to Souca and landed 
 a few troops. However, as soon as the advance of the 
 Saracens was announced, panic seized upon them and 
 they fled in confusion to their ships at the first brush 
 with the invaders. Finally a fourth expedition in 668 
 under Rouaifi pillaged all the sea-coast of Tripoli and 
 captured the island of Djerba (Girba) 2 . 
 
 The time had now come for a serious attempt to 
 conquer and occupy the Province. Henceforward the 
 Saracens were no longer content with marauding raids, 
 but set themselves to form regular settlements in the 
 rich plains of Africa. In 669 Okba-ben-Nafa was 
 
 1 Mercier, Hist, de VAfrique, Bk. n. ii. 6 — 8. 
 
 2 Mercier, n. ii. 9 — 10. 
 
216 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 nominated Governor of Africa and despatched with 
 10,000 Mussulmans and some converted Berbers to 
 establish himself in Byzacene. The Djerba, or the 
 southern frontier districts of the Province, were again 
 overrun, Gafca and other towns were taken, and the 
 Christians treated with the utmost barbarity. But the 
 most important achievement of this expedition was the 
 building of a town, called Kairouan, right in the heart 
 of Byzacene. Such an outpost as this gave the Saracens 
 an excellent base from which to push forward future 
 invasions, and served to overawe the inhabitants and 
 prevent the Mohammedan Berbers from reverting to 
 their former religions. 
 
 Okba was not allowed to enjoy the fruits of his 
 victory, for the new governor of Egypt, who had a kind 
 of suzerainty over the Saracens in Africa, sent in 
 A.D. 672 Abou-el-Mohadjir to supersede him. The 
 new general shewed his childish petulance in objecting 
 to his predecessor having the honour and glory of 
 founding Kairouan, and actually pulled it down and 
 erected another town, a few miles distant from the 
 old site. The Moors under their chief Koceila de- 
 termined to test whether the new governor was able 
 to hold his own, and rose against him, but were how- 
 ever defeated at Tlemcen and were forced to profess 
 Mohammedanism. This trouble disposed of, El Mo- 
 hadjir turned his arms against the Christians of the 
 north-east, and captured the peninsula of Cherik (Cape 
 Bon). From thence he marched to attack Carthage 
 itself, but met with a vigorous resistance. A fierce 
 battle raged all day, and at nightfall the Saracens 
 drew off and encamped on a mountain in the south of 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 217 
 
 Tunis. The attack was not renewed, a treaty was 
 made, and for a time the Christians had peace 1 . 
 
 What was now the position of the wretched pro- 
 vince ? Already it seems that the power of Rome had 
 passed away, and in less than thirty years from the 
 first onslaught upou the outskirts of Africa the Sara- 
 cens had overrun all its most fertile parts. Already 
 the Christians seemed no longer formidable, though 
 still perchance strong enough to defend themselves, 
 and the invaders decided to leave them alone until the 
 situation demanded their overthrow. The weakness of 
 the Christians was shewn alike in their impotence to 
 even threaten the foundation of Kairouan, or to make 
 a defensive alliance with the Moors ; and the Saracens 
 shewed their contempt by leaving them on their flank 
 while they pressed forward into the heart of the 
 province. 
 
 Meanwhile as the power of the Cross grew less, 
 that of the Crescent rapidly increased. In Kairouan 
 the Mohammedans had a base of operations right in 
 the heart of Byzacene, and only three days' march from 
 Carthage 2 , which acted as a wedge to split up the 
 country before them. The Moors remained as ever 
 disunited ; some of them, like the people of Kocei'la, 
 were compulsorily converted. Even the independent 
 tribes could offer no resistance, and the invaders were 
 able to push their expeditions as far as Tlemcen, the 
 extreme limit of the Roman power as restored by 
 Belisarius. Africa indeed lay at the feet of the Saracens, 
 who could choose their own time to complete their 
 conquest. Such a fate as this necessarily implied much 
 
 1 Mercier, n. ii. 11 — 12. 2 Fournel, Les Berbers, p. 163. 
 
218 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 suffering. The Greek historians declare that eighty 
 thousand provincials were reduced to slavery ; and 
 though this may be an exaggeration, the very greatness 
 of the exaggeration reveals the effect produced on the 
 minds of contemporaries 1 . 
 
 In 681 Okba returned to the scene of his old triumphs 
 and at once proceeded to hasten the conquest of Africa. 
 He performed the wonderful feat, worthy of the Roman 
 army in its prime, of marching across the wild and 
 mountainous interior until he reached the Atlantic 
 Ocean. His first steps on coming back to Africa were 
 to throw El Mohadjir into chains, to demolish New 
 Kairouan and rebuild the old city ; and then setting 
 out on his march, he took the important position of 
 Mount Aurasius and captured Baghaia and Lambaesa, 
 towns on the North and North-east of this table-land. 
 Next turning South, he passed through the whole of the 
 Zab and went by Tiharet to Ceuta, the town facing the 
 Straits of Gibraltar, and from there marched right 
 through the heart of the Atlas mountains till he reached 
 the sea at Sous, not far from the southern boundary of 
 modern Morocco. 
 
 A few interesting events happened on this long, 
 daring march. At Lambaesa the Saracens had to over- 
 come a fierce resistance on the part of the garrison of 
 Moors and Christians, one of the few instances in 
 which there is any record of an alliance of these peoples, 
 without which it was hopeless to try to cut off the 
 invaders. Tiharet, too, was defended by Moors and 
 Franks, but the latter returned home on the fall of 
 the place. At Ceuta, Okba was received with politic 
 1 Theophanes, s.a. 661 ; Cedrenua, Hist. Com. ,. 764. 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 219 
 
 friendliness by Julian, the semi-independent governor, 
 and was informed that the Moors of the district were the 
 grossest barbarians, and were practically subject to no 
 authority whatever. At Nafis in Morocco, he was nearly 
 defeated by the Masmoudah tribes, but was rescued in 
 his peril by the "Zeneti" or "converted" ; probably this 
 is another instance of the jealousy which ruined Africa, 
 and tribal hate rather than religious zeal seems likely 
 to have inspired the rescue of these so-called converts. 
 
 On his return march Okba regarded his conquest 
 as so secure that he could safely split his army into 
 detachments, but unfortunately he forgot that in his 
 insolent folly he had insisted upon Koceila, the Berber 
 chief, performing menial duties. He paid dearly for this 
 impolitic arrogance. Suddenly, when he had reached 
 Tobna in Numidia with only a few cavalry, he found 
 the country in arms, and the gates of Badis shut 
 against him. However he made a gallant attempt to 
 capture Tehouda, and there, with his rival El Mohadjir 
 and all his small force, he met a soldier's death at the 
 hands of a large force of Christians and Moors. His 
 fall was the signal for a general rising of the Ber- 
 bers, and Zoheir-ben-Kais, his successor, was forced to 
 abandon Kai'rouan and Africa, and betake himself to 
 strong encampments in Barca 1 . 
 
 Once more Africa enjoyed a brief period of repose. 
 The Saracens with as little wisdom as their foes, but 
 with far less danger to themselves, indulged in the 
 luxury of civil war. But after five years of strife the 
 
 1 On Okba's expedition, see Meroier, in. ii. 13—14 ; Fournel ; Ibn 
 Khaldoun, i. 22, etc., i. 287, etc.; En Noweiri, p. 322, etc.; El 
 K'Airouani, § 13. 
 
220 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Kharedjites won the day, and set themselves to de- 
 liberately exterminate the Unbelievers, root and branch. 
 In 688, Zohel'r advanced into Africa and drove Koceila 
 from Kairouan to Mems, a town on the eastern branch 
 of the Medjerda river. Here a bloody battle was fought ; 
 on the one side blind fanaticism and proselytizing zeal, 
 on the other the love of liberty and the power of despair 
 animated the combatants ; in the end the invaders 
 carried all before them, and the Berbers with their 
 Christian allies were routed with awful slaughter. El 
 K'Airouani declares the fugitives were butchered like 
 sheep ; and Ibn Khaldoun dates the fall of the Latin 
 power from this battle. The Moors suffered as much 
 as their allies and the Cloureba tribe was almost 
 entirely destroyed 1 . 
 
 In spite of this signal triumph Zohel'r decided to 
 evacuate Africa. Of his reasons, the most potent was 
 the smallness of his force and the turbulence of the 
 enemy, the most curious the fear lest possession of too 
 much wealth should injure his soul. In his retreat he 
 shewed the faults and shared the fate of his great pre- 
 decessor Okba. He travelled with too small an escort, 
 through over-confidence, and was defeated and slain by 
 a few Greeks who had landed at Barca. 
 
 For seven years, from 690 to 697, Africa was free 
 from the Saracens, but rent with civil war. Koceila 
 was now no more, and on his death all the petty chiefs, 
 who had been his dependents, struggled to succeed to 
 his power; perhaps, the Christians also tried to re- 
 cover their lost dominions. The internal dissensions 
 of the Mohammedans however prevented them from 
 1 Mercier, n. ii. 17 — 18. 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 221 
 
 taking advantage of the divisions of Africa, and before 
 they were ready to renew their invasion a great power 
 had arisen out of the confusion of the Province. The 
 government of Africa had been seized by the virile 
 hands of Dihia or Damia, Queen of the Djerouana, com- 
 monly known by her title of Cahina or the Diviner 1 . 
 
 In 697 the fifth expedition of the Saracens started 
 from Egypt. Hassan-ibn-en-Noman-el-Ghassani was 
 despatched to Africa with 40,000 men and occupied 
 Kairouani without resistance. His first step was to dis- 
 cover the most dangerous of his foes, who were still too 
 divided to be considered as one force. The Christians of 
 Carthage enjoyed this dangerous distinction, and against 
 them Hassan immediately marched. He seems to have 
 taken the city completely by surprise. The inhabitants 
 of the suburbs were put to the sword, the aqueducts 
 were unguarded and immediately cut, and the people 
 within the walls were forced to enter into negotiations. 
 The Saracens were promised supplies for all their needs 
 if they would undertake not to enter the city. Whether 
 these terms were accepted is not clear ; probably there 
 was no time to effect any settlement, for the same night 
 all who were able to flee stole away by sea, some to 
 Sicily, others to Spain. Next day Hassan entered the 
 almost deserted city. None but the meanest inhabit- 
 ants were left, and much of the most valuable booty 
 had doubtless disappeared. In their rage at being 
 thus cheated, the conquerors pillaged and burnt on 
 every side, and all who had not succeeded in getting 
 away had to pay the penalty of their countrymen's 
 escape. The neighbouring Berbers hastened to seize 
 1 Mercier, n. ii. 19 — 21. 
 
222 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Carthage when Hassan was gone, and continued the 
 work of destruction begun by him; but they were 
 soon driven out by the Saracens, the buildings were 
 razed to the ground, and a small Mohammedan garrison 
 was left to hold the site of the once glorious city. 
 
 The Christians made one last struggle to regain 
 Africa. The weakness of the Moslem force did not escape 
 the Emperor Leo (The Isaurian), and John the Patrician 
 was despatched to retake Carthage. The principal 
 defence of the harbour was a chain stretched across 
 its mouth, but the fleet broke this and the city at 
 once fell. The Saracen garrison was put to the sword, 
 and once more for a few months the Roman Empire 
 could count Carthage amongst its dominions. John 
 did not rest content with the capture of the city, but 
 went on to free the towns in the neighbourhood which 
 still resisted the Mohammedans, and, leaving a small 
 force behind for the winter, sailed away home. 
 
 The Christians' success was very short-lived. In the 
 spring of 698 Hassan once more marched against the 
 deserted city and easily drove out its Greek defenders. 
 The Caliph Abd-el-Melik-ben-Merouan had heard with 
 the utmost consternation of the success of John, and he 
 now bade Abd-el-Aziz, the governor of Egypt, send a 
 thousand Coptic families to form a strong colony at 
 Carthage. Hassan also improved the port by a canal 
 at Rades, and built a naval arsenal, so that the modern 
 Tunis became one of the chief bulwarks of the Saracen 
 domination of Africa 1 . 
 
 1 For the capture of Carthage, see Mercier, n. it 22 ; Fournel ; 
 En Noweiri, p. 339 ; El K'Airouani, § 22 ; Bk. i. p. 12 ; Theophanes, 
 s.a. 690 ; Zonar. Ann. m. 76 — 7. 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 223 
 
 With Carthage fell the last vestiges of the power of 
 the Empire over the old province; and the rest of the 
 story of the Saracen conquest of Africa is concerned 
 with the subjection of the Moors alone. 
 
 But these were destined to give a great deal of 
 trouble before they were finally conquered, and the 
 struggle was sufficiently protracted to complete the 
 devastation of the once fertile province. For at length 
 the Berber tribes were united, and their Queen Cahina 
 was prepared to resist the invaders to the utmost. 
 Hassan, as soon as Carthage was recovered, turned 
 against her and was severely defeated at Ouad-Nini 
 near the Mishiana River, not far from Baghaia and 
 Mount Aurasius ; and so strong indeed did the Moors 
 seem that he once more retreated to Barca, and 
 remained there for five years in an entrenched 
 camp. 
 
 Cahina turned this respite to the best advantage 
 by the policy of a true barbarian. She argued that 
 the invaders were attracted merely by the fertile 
 plains and the luxurious remains of the old Roman 
 civilization, and that, were the lowlands to become as 
 barren as the mountains, there would be little fear of 
 further attack. As for herself and her people, they 
 cared nothing for these things; the bare living afforded 
 by the uplands more than satisfied their simple wants. 
 She therefore determined to make Africa as unat- 
 tractive as possible and to put an end to the invasions 
 by removing the cause. The whole province was to 
 be laid waste; from east to west fire and destruction 
 were to reduce everything to desolation, and the plains 
 were to be made as sterile as the hills. Her orders 
 
224 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 were obeyed with too great thoroughness, and she did 
 not foresee the inevitable consequence. Her barbarity 
 alienated the lowland population, and the small farmers 
 and the few Christians who remained now looked for 
 the advent of the Mohammedans as their salvation 
 from the Moors 1 . 
 
 In 703 the last act of the tragedy begins. Hassan 
 again advanced, and defeated and slew Cahina in the 
 district of Kastiliya, not far from Mt Aurasius. With 
 her fell the independence of Africa, and the next few 
 years saw the Saracen power finally established from 
 Tripoli to Ceuta. The conquest was not, however, due 
 to the might of the Mussulman arm alone. Like 
 India, Africa could only be conquered by the help of 
 the native tribes. Hassan saw the hopelessness of 
 attempting to subdue the mountainous districts of 
 Mauritania with his own men, and he raised a large 
 number of auxiliaries from the Berber tribes. The 
 sons of Cahina were put at the head of 12,000 Moorish 
 warriors, and by their aid the Saracen dominions were 
 rapidly enlarged. However, Hassan was not to finish 
 the work he had begun ; in 705 he was superseded by 
 Mouca-ben-Noceir, who was the first governor of Africa 
 independent of the province of Egypt. The new leader 
 completed the subjection of the west; frequent expedi- 
 tions established the Mohammedan rule in Mauritania, 
 and even Julian, the semi-independent governor of 
 Ceuta, was at length induced, possibly for private rea- 
 sons, to form an alliance with the victorious invaders. 
 
 1 For Queen Cahina, see Mereier, n. ii. 23 — 4; El K'Airouani, 
 §§ 23—4; Ibn Khaldoun, I. 207, etc., in. 173, etc.; En Noweiri, 
 p. 339, etc. 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 225 
 
 In 708 Nocear returned to Kai'rouan, and the conquest 
 of Africa was at last complete 1 . 
 
 But what had become of the Roman and Christian 
 population ? In the first place it must be remembered 
 that long before the Saracen invasions the dominions 
 of the Romans had begun to contract. The Moors 
 had encroached on every side, and the boundaries of 
 the Province had steadily receded, until in the first 
 years of the seventh century they included little more 
 than Proconsularis, part of Byzacene, some of Numidia, 
 and the eastern districts of Mauritania Sitifiensis. As 
 soon as the Saracen storm burst the wealthier Christians 
 fled. Ibn Khaldoun 3 distinctly says that "the Franks, 
 driven from their African possessions, returned to their 
 country beyond the sea," and again, " the debris of the 
 Frankish and Greek population took refuge in Sicily 
 and Spain." In another place he tells us how Noceir 
 found "Africa changed to a vast solitude," and that the 
 Berbers alone continued to resist. En Noweiri 3 too 
 records the flight of the people of Carthage to the 
 Mediterranean Isles. For the Province made no re- 
 sistance worthy of its former power. There was no 
 attempt to unite the Moors and Romans against the 
 invaders, and only in a very few instances do we find 
 them fighting side by side. At Lambaesa and Tiharet 
 the garrisons were of mixed race, at the battles of 
 Tehouda and Mems an allied force fought; but the 
 Christians never took the lead in defending the 
 Province, and after the victory of Zoheiir in 668 
 
 1 Mercier, n. ii. §§ 25—26. 
 
 2 Ibn Khaldoun, in. 191, 193 ; i. 215. 
 » En Now&ri, p. 339. 
 
 H. 15 
 
226 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 a united front was not again presented to the 
 Mohammedans. 
 
 There was besides a great difference in the ways 
 that the two nations resisted. The Berbers fought 
 bravely for their native land, and under Kocei'la and 
 Cahina managed to check for a time the Saracen 
 advance. Their success might have been permanent 
 if they had been united ; but internal differences were 
 their ruin, and their lack of cohesion and the attraction 
 of the sensual Moslem religion stood in the way of 
 a prolonged resistance. In fact the defence of the 
 Moors failed, not because they lacked vigour, but be- 
 cause their vigour was misapplied and misdirected. 
 On the other hand, the Christians seemed incapable of 
 self-preservation, and their whole policy betrays the 
 utter feebleness of a worn-out race. After the fall of 
 Gregory the story of the defence of Africa consists in 
 a catalogue of ineffectual attempts at succour by the 
 Emperors, and inglorious truces and retreats on the 
 part of the provincials. That their strength was still 
 not to be despised is proved by the reluctance of the 
 Saracens to attack them directly, but, instead of 
 opposing the invaders whenever possible, the degene- 
 rate Eomans stood ignobly on the defensive. As soon 
 as Gregory was slain the Christians of Carthage bought 
 Zobe'i'r off. The expedition of Nicephorus fled at the 
 first approach of the enemy. Kai'rouan was founded 
 without any interference from Carthage, and the Chris- 
 tians of Numidia were content with the peninsula of 
 Cherik. On the first attack of Carthage the in- 
 habitants fled, and the temporary success of John the 
 Patrician only proves how unequal the Empire was to 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 227 
 
 the task of reconquering Africa. In fact, as the Sara- 
 cens advanced the power of the old masters of the 
 Province dwindled away. The Soman population of 
 Africa seems rather to have decayed of its own hope- 
 less unsoundness than to have been destroyed by direct 
 violence on the part of the Saracens. 
 
 Of course large numbers of Christians were reduced 
 to slavery by the Mohammedans, for flight was not 
 possible to the poorer of the Romans. Theophanes 
 says that 80,000 were carried off by Okba 1 , and En 
 Nowe'iri puts the prisoners of Hassan at 35,000 2 ; but 
 these very numbers shew that the Saracens might have 
 been met by a bolder resistance. But for the most 
 part the Christians fled, and the once masters of Africa 
 were scattered over the face of the earth. In 684, the 
 14th Council of Toledo in Spain invited Potentinus, 
 Bishop of Utica, to attend, and Gregory II. had to warn 
 the German episcopate against African fugitives tainted 
 with Donatist and Manichaean heresies 3 . 
 
 The conquest of the Province seems to have followed 
 these lines. At the beginning the Roman inhabitants 
 held the north-east districts and were hemmed in on 
 all sides by Moors, over whom they had little more 
 than a nominal suzerainty. Both for geographical and 
 strategic reasons the first Saracen attacks were directed 
 against the Berbers, for the prestige of the Empire 
 and its command of the sea made the invaders un- 
 willing to provoke its resistance until they had secured 
 a firm basis for their power in the first countries that 
 they reached west of the terrible deserts of Barca. 
 
 1 Theophanes, a. a., 661. 2 En Noweiri, p. 341. 
 
 3 Morcelli, s. a. 669 ; Greg. II. Ep. 124. 
 
 15—2 
 
228 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 When this was done and the Saracens could feel secure 
 in a proper centre of operations with a regularly estab- 
 lished line of communication with Egypt, they were 
 ready to press on against the Christian portions of 
 Africa. But their rapid advance in the south and 
 west and their extensive depredations had frightened 
 the remains of the old Roman population, and all who 
 could had fled, long before the first march on Carthage, 
 to Europe and the Mediterranean isles. The mere 
 reputation of the Saracens was enough ; before their 
 steady progress the power of the Christians crumbled 
 to dust, and when the time came for the invaders to 
 make their final attack the remnants of the Roman 
 Empire were capable of only the feeblest resistance. 
 The people who had ruled the Province for more 
 than seven hundred years were gone ; not because 
 they were conquered or slain, but because, enervated 
 by centuries of luxury, wasted by endless conflicts 
 with a remorseless border-foe, when they were ex- 
 posed to the attack of a new and terrible enemy 
 they had preferred flight to a hard and doubtful 
 conflict. 
 
 As soon as the Saracens were firmly established in 
 their new dominions they set about organizing the 
 government and began to oppress the few Christians 
 that remained. Hassan had imposed the Kharedj, a 
 tax of one-third on all their possessions, upon Christians 
 and Berbers alike, and this was now still more strictly 
 exacted by Noceir 1 . " All the Christian churches were 
 made mosques," says the author of the Baian, and 
 
 1 Ibn Khaldoun, § 25. 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 229 
 
 though this was not literally true, all who refused to 
 accept Islam were subjected to the greatest hardships 1 . 
 No doubt the remorseless weight of the Moslem 
 rule played havoc with the weaker Christians. The 
 advantages to be derived from being ranked with their 
 conquerors, safety from religious persecution and the 
 seductions of the simple and sensual Mohammedan 
 creed, must have been powerful arguments to the rude 
 Berber minds, and probably the great majority of the 
 Christians who remained had more Moorish than 
 Roman blood in their veins. If, moreover, it is re- 
 membered that Africa, though conquered, was not at 
 peace and that civil wars with all their attendant 
 massacres and destruction continued for nearly forty 
 years, it will not seem to have been a great exaggera- 
 tion on the part of Abd-el-Rahman when in 743 he 
 said he could send no more Christian slaves to the 
 Caliph, because all Africa had now become Moham- 
 medan 2 ; for many of those who had for a time been 
 true to their Faith had doubtless fallen away, and 
 others must have been slain, while those who remained 
 would not obtrude their creed on their conquerors or 
 would flee away to inaccessible mountain fastnesses. 
 It is perhaps possible that certain Berber tribes whose 
 customs still shew some traces of Christian morality, 
 such as the practice of monogamy, and of Christian 
 institutions, such as Baptism and the use of cruciform 
 ornaments, may trace their origin to the semi-Christian- 
 ized tribes who fled before the power of Islam 3 . 
 
 1 Mercier, n. ii. 26. 2 Gibbon, ch. 51. 
 
 3 Mas Latrie, Relations et Commerce de VAfrique Septentrionale, 
 pp. 7—8. 
 
230 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 From this time onwards N. Africa ceases to be 
 reckoned as a Christian country. Christians were 
 indeed still to be found within the limits of the old 
 Roman province, but taken as a whole the religion 
 of Africa was now Mohammedan and the survival of 
 a few followers of Christ can only be accounted for 
 by the fewness of the numbers. No longer has the 
 historian to record the development and power of a 
 great organization ; he can now merely watch the few 
 remnants that remain, until they too at the end of 
 nine hundred years are swept away. 
 
 When the rule of the Saracens had been firmly 
 established their bitterness against the Christians 
 seems to have been much diminished. Just as in 
 Toledo, Sardinia, and Sicily the Moslem conquerors 
 through caution or carelessness allowed their subjects 
 freedom of religion, so in Africa Christianity was tole- 
 rated. The churches were not destroyed, but mosques 
 were built opposite to them. The mosques flourished, 
 the churches fell into decay, and the social and political 
 strength of Islam was a more dangerous foe to Chris- 
 tianity than direct religious persecution 1 . 
 
 It was not long before the number of the Christians 
 had so far diminished that the Apostolic succession 
 was in danger, for the African bishops were too few in 
 number to consecrate successors according to canonical 
 rule. An appeal was made to the Jacobite patriarch of 
 Alexandria, and he sent in 837 a mission of five bishops 
 to foster the last remnants of Christianity in Africa. 
 This recourse to foreign help proves how near the great 
 
 1 El Tidjani, in Mas Latrie, p. 7. 
 
THE END OF AFEICAN CHRISTIANITY. 231 
 
 communion of Carthage was to utter extinction 1 . But 
 even the few Christians who remained were not united ; 
 in 893 a schism arose among them, which caused an 
 appeal to Pope Formosus, and was referred to Arch- 
 bishop Fulc of Rheims 2 - 
 
 For 150 years no more is. heard of the African 
 Church. None of its bishops attended the seventh 
 General Council at Nicaea in 787, or the Council of 
 Constantinople in 869, and yet the next record of it 
 shews its political power was not to be despised. Indeed 
 a meteor-like flash of glory brightens up its history. 
 In 1048, El Moezy, the Ziride, set up as an independent 
 ruler in Africa and tried to form a Berber kingdom. 
 The Caliph El Mostancer sent the Hilaliens, or pre- 
 datory Arabs from higher Egypt, to recover his do- 
 minions, and for three years, 1052-5, all Africa was 
 given up to plunder and violence. In this disorder the 
 Christians were not directly attacked, but of course 
 suffered as much as the rest of their neighbours. As 
 a measure of self-defence they organized themselves 
 under the leadership of a certain Mornak, and took up 
 a position at Hamman el Lif, a town five leagues west 
 of Tunis. Here they beat off all enemies and became 
 so strong that the Emir of Carthage left them alone, 
 and even granted them a strip of fertile land whereon 
 they could live an independent life. This territory was 
 called Mornak until almost our own time, and contains 
 the ruins of a synagogue and of another building which 
 may have been a basilica 3 . 
 
 1 Gibbon, ch. 51. 2 Mas Latrie, 19. 
 
 3 Maa Latrie, 26—9. 
 
232 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 The prospects of the Christians evidently improved 
 for a time and it may be to this period that a docu- 
 ment of great importance relates. A Notitia of the 
 bishops of Africa, the Balearic Isles, and Sardinia, has 
 come down to us, of which unfortunately both the origin 
 and date are unknown. For it declares that at the 
 time of its compilation there were no less than 47 sees 
 existing in these countries. In Byzacene there were 
 14, amongst which the most prominent were Carthage, 
 Carthago Proconsularis, Gafsa, and Adrumetum ; in 
 Numidia 15, including Calama, Hippo, and Constantine ; 
 in Mauritania Sitifiensis one, Khinocucurum, and in 
 Tingitana and the isles 17, of which the chief were 
 Ceuta, Majorca, Minorca and Sardinia. Of these 
 bishops four held archiepiscopal rank 1 . 
 
 From this Notitia it seems that the two provinces 
 of Proconsularis and Byzacene were now united, and 
 that the distribution of the Christians of this period — 
 if this document can indeed be attributed to this period 
 — corresponds closely with the dominion of the Church 
 in its prosperity. In the eastern parts of Africa there 
 are now 14 sees, in Numidia 15, but in the first Mauri- 
 tania, there is only one, while of the 17 recorded under 
 the second Mauritania, several are not African at all. 
 It seems then that in the eleventh, as in the fifth 
 century, the Gospel of Christ had made few converts 
 amongsb the wild barbarians of the mountains of 
 Mauritania 2 . 
 
 1 Mas Latrie, p. 28. 
 
 2 The Notitia as given in Bp Beveridge's Pandectae Canonum 
 (Oxford, 1672), Vol. ii., note to p. 142, is 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 233 
 
 There is one curious omission in this Notitia. The 
 Bishopric of Gummi is not mentioned. Where it was 
 is uncertain ; M. de Mas Latrie identifies it with 
 Mornak, but on merely conjectural grounds. But of 
 the importance of Gummi in the eleventh century there 
 
 Sub gloriosissimo Eparcho Africae. 
 
 1. Cartagena Proconsularis 
 
 2. Sybiba 
 
 3. Campsia 
 
 4. Ciltos 
 
 5. Junces 
 
 6. Talepteo 
 
 7. Caseala 
 
 8. Castellae 
 
 9. Pezana 
 
 10. Mamida 
 
 11. Madasuba 
 
 12. Colulea 
 
 13. Capses 
 
 14. Adramytto 
 
 1. Calama 
 
 2. Tebete. 
 
 3. Hippon 
 
 4. Nuzidias 
 
 5. Castramagae 
 
 6. Bades 
 
 7. Meleum 
 
 8. Leradus 
 
 Provincia Numidiae. 
 
 9. Castrum Bedeie 
 
 10. Soele 
 
 11. Egerinesium 
 
 12. Titessin 
 
 13. Bages 
 
 14. Constantine 
 
 15. Sitiphnos 
 
 Provincia Mauritaniae Primae. 
 
 1. Bhinocucurum. 
 Provincia Mauritaniae Secundae. 
 
 1. Septum 
 
 2. Septum, ad partem Thenessi 
 
 3. Spanias 
 
 4. Mesopotameni ad partem 
 
 Spaniae 
 
 5. Najurica, insula 
 
 6. Menyca, insula 
 
 7. Insula Sardow 
 
 8. Carallus, metropolis 
 
 9. lures 
 
 10. Sanaphas 
 
 11. Sines 
 
 12. Sulces 
 
 13. Phaesiana 
 
 14. Chrysopolis 
 
 15. Aristianes 
 
 16. Limne 
 
 17. Castrum Tutar. 
 
234 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 is no doubt. In fact so much did its bishop take upon 
 himself that he aroused the anger of three of his 
 brethren, Thomas, Peter, and John, who appealed 
 against him to Rome. In 1053, Leo IX. issued two 
 decretals in their favour censuring the presumptuous 
 prelate. He praised Peter and John for trying to call 
 a council according to the ecclesiastical rule ; he ordered 
 annual synods to be held when possible ; and he declared 
 the Bishop of Carthage to be the Metropolitan of all 
 Africa, who was alone to receive the pallium, because 
 St Cyprian had by his piety bestowed everlasting 
 honour on the see. Whether the decision of the Pope 
 closed the dispute is not recorded, but probably the see 
 of Gummi gave way. It is however noticeable that five 
 bishops are mentioned as being concerned in this 
 quarrel 1 . 
 
 This number was dangerously small, and great diffi- 
 culty was once more found in carrying on the Apostolic 
 succession according to the conditions of the canons. 
 The bishops, too, found the other clergy and laity 
 unwilling to respect their authority. In 1073 Cyriac, 
 Bishop of Carthage, was urged by some of his clergy to 
 lay hands upon a man 2 unfitted for his sacred calling, 
 either through his age, ignorance, or morals. The 
 bishop refused, and so great a disturbance was caused 
 that the Mussulman Emir interfered and tried to 
 induce Cyriac to accept the people's choice in order 
 that peace might be preserved. Cyriac however stood 
 firm in his resolution, and even when haled to prison, 
 
 1 Mas Latrie, 29—31 ; Gibbon, ch. 51. 
 
 2 It is not clear whether the people wished this man to be made 
 a priest or a bishop. 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 235 
 
 publicly insulted, disrobed and scourged, he still per- 
 sisted. In this crisis Gregory VII. wrote two letters, 
 one of admonition to the people of Carthage, the other 
 of exhortation to Cyriac. Once more our records fail 
 without telling us how the matter ended. 
 
 Gregory soon had occasion to interfere again in 
 the affairs of Africa. The number of bishops had 
 still further fallen, so that only two were left where 
 once there had been 400; and the Pope was asked 
 to consecrate an African priest to ensure the presence 
 of the canonical three. But no sooner had the new 
 prelate returned to his native land than the Bishop 
 of Hippo died, and the Church was in the same 
 danger as before. Not only was it impossible to 
 carry on the succession with only two bishops, but 
 the number of Christians and the size of the area over 
 which they were scattered demanded the services of at 
 least three prelates. Gregory therefore wrote again to 
 Cyriac and bade him choose, in consultation with his 
 lately consecrated colleague, a priest worthy of the 
 episcopate, on whom he would himself lay hands, if he 
 came to Rome. Cyriac sent Servandus, with the assent 
 of En-Nacer or Anzir, King of Mauritania. How- 
 ever the people of Hippo did not approve of his choice ; 
 for inhabiting as they did a city near the heart of the 
 Moorish power, they were no doubt unwilling to submit 
 to the dictation of the bishop of a place the importance 
 of which was now based entirely upon historical grounds. 
 Gregory therefore wrote to them to point out the 
 obedience they owed to their bishop 1 . 
 
 1 Mas Latrie, 38—41 ; Gibbon, loc. cit. ; Greg. VII. Epp. 19—21. 
 
236 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 These few glimpses, scanty though they are, shew that 
 in the eleventh century the position of the Christians 
 amongst the Moors was not entirely unbearable. The 
 establishment of Mornak shewed the strength of the 
 Christians and the toleration of the Moors. The Emir 
 of Carthage and the King of Mauritania both shewed a 
 not unkindly interest in the selection of the Christian 
 clergy. But more remarkable still are the letters 
 which passed between Pope Gregory and the King En- 
 Nacer. The Moors in allowing Servandus to go to 
 Rome seat presents and friendly messages by him, and 
 released many Christian prisoners. The Pope wrote 
 and thanked him for this gracious act, reminded him 
 of his promise to release yet more, and declared that 
 such deeds were prompted by the hand of God, for 
 both Christian and Mohammedan worshipped the same 
 God, and both, though in different ways, daily praised 
 and adored the Creator of the ages and the Ruler of 
 the world 1 . 
 
 Although the chief men among the Moors seem to 
 have been disposed to tolerate the Church, it yet suffered 
 great losses between 1053 and 1073. M. de Mas Latrie 
 attributes the circumstance either to the stress of civil 
 war, or to the possible apostasy of the Bishop of Gummi 
 after the victory of Carthage, or to the gathering of 
 the Christians to El Cala, the new capital of the Ham- 
 madites. However that may be, El Bekir writing in 
 1068 declares that Christianity has disappeared in 
 Algeria, the Djerid, and Byzacene, but that at Tlemcen 
 there still remains a Christian church and a Christian 
 congregation 2 . 
 
 1 Greg. VII. Ep. 21. a Mas Latrie, 38—41. 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 237 
 
 The toleration of the Church may have been due 
 to the political events of the time. Africa was in 
 disorder, and the strength of the Christian community 
 of Mornak, with their relations to the steadily recover- 
 ing power of Rome, made them a factor in the political 
 situation. In 1007 Hammad, the son of Bologgiun, 
 founded El Cala, between Msilah and S6tif, and peopled 
 it with men collected from all parts, including many 
 Christians. In 1014-5 he threw off the yoke of the 
 Zirides, the local chiefs, declared himself directly under 
 the Abassides of Egypt, and managed to secure the 
 rule of all Numidia and Sitifiensis and of part of 
 Caesariensis. In 1062 En-Nacer succeeded him, and 
 five years later founded Bougie, to the west of El Cala, 
 on the coast of Mauritania Caesariensis, near Saldae. 
 To this new city El Mansour transferred the seat of 
 government in 1090-1 *. 
 
 However, the Christians of El Cala still stayed there 
 and kept up a regular organization after most of the 
 population had migrated to Bougie. Their church was 
 consecrated to the Virgin Mary and was served by 
 Calife, the last of the African bishops of whom any 
 records have endured. Round this church a few legends 
 have gathered. The monks of Mont Cassim were cap- 
 tured by the Moors as they sailed from Sardinia to 
 Africa and were sent to El Cala until they were 
 ransomed by Count Roger. Before they were released 
 Azzar, the eldest, died and was buried before the high 
 altar. One night, a month after his death, a Mo- 
 hammedan Berber saw him sitting and reading his 
 Bible at the entrance to the church. Startled at this 
 i Mas Latrie, 32—4. 
 
238 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 apparition the Moor ran and called his neighbours with 
 the words, " Come, run ! you know the priest of the 
 Christians, who is dead this month past. Come and 
 see him sitting on the threshold of the church ! " But 
 by the time the neighbours had answered his summons 
 the vision had disappeared. Moreover the lamp before 
 Azzar's tomb was lighted by no human hands. It was 
 vain to fill it with water instead of oil ; an Arab 
 Emir himself watched from Calife's house and saw a 
 star descend from heaven and set the wick alight 1 . 
 
 However, neither miracles nor sanctity could protect 
 the Christians for ever. In 1152 Abd-el-Moumon took 
 El Cala and dispersed the inhabitants. The foreign 
 Christian merchants took refuge in Bougie, but the 
 fate of the native Churches is unknown. The Almo- 
 hades subdued all Africa and their conquests inevitably 
 implied great sufferings to the conquered. In particular 
 we hear that Abd-el-Moumon forcibly converted all the 
 Jews and Christians of Tunis in 1159. Still in 1192, 
 the name of the Archbishop of Carthage appears in 
 the Liber Censuum, but this does not prove' that the 
 holder of the title had anything more than a nominal 
 authority. Perhaps he was in exile or in hiding, 
 and it is not impossible that, like the bishops in 
 partibus infidelium of a later date, the nominal oc- 
 cupant of the see had never been near it at all 2 . 
 
 In fact by the end of the twelfth century the native 
 Christians had become a very insignificant body. Inter- 
 national politics however were in their favour. The 
 masters of Africa were forced to practise some sort of 
 toleration and some Christian settlers were allowed the 
 1 Pierre Diacre in Mas Latrie, 124 — 8. 2 Mas Latrie, 124 — 8. 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 239 
 
 free exercise of their religion. At least two Christian 
 colonies were thus established. At Serdania near 
 Kairouan and Djeloula the Sardinians had a settlement, 
 and at Castilia near Touzer other foreigners, perhaps 
 Spaniards, dwelt. But the presence of these Europeans 
 did little to help the African Christians. For some 
 adopted the habits and religion of their neighbours, 
 and the others, busy with their own concerns and 
 apprehensive of their own dangers, were indifferent to 
 their needs. 
 
 On the other hand some good indirectly accrued 
 to them through the number of Christian slaves 
 in Africa; for their natural anxiety to escape from 
 their captivity brought about a regular system of ex- 
 change of prisoners between the Europeans and the 
 Moors. No doubt it was a very profitable business for 
 the latter, and they therefore allowed the Christians 
 to carry it on in their own way. For the Church, 
 regarding the ransom of slaves as an act of piety, 
 organized their restoration on a regular religious basis 
 and entrusted it to the Franciscan and Dominican 
 orders and to the Monks of the Redeemer, who were 
 instituted for this special work. In 1189, Pope Inno- 
 cent III. announced the foundation of this order to the 
 Sultan Almanzor in a very impolitic letter. With a 
 most arrogant air of superiority the Pontiff pities the 
 benighted condition of the Moors, and declares that 
 these new monks would devote one-third of their 
 possessions to ransoming slaves, and would purchase 
 "pagans" to exchange for Christians. 
 
 Though officially countenanced the monks had some 
 1 Mas Latrie, 128—9. 
 
240 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 risks to run. It was easier for the Sultan to declare 
 he would protect them than to save them from the 
 irresponsible violence of Moslem fanatics, and in 1226 
 Honorius III. was obliged to allow them to wear beards 
 in order that they might attract less attention by con- 
 forming to the ordinary dress of the country. By this 
 time they had become sufficiently numerous to need 
 supervision and in 1223 a bishop was appointed over 
 them. Besides ransoming prisoners they distributed 
 alms, and no doubt they alleviated the sufferings and 
 revived the faith of those whom they could not release 1 
 No doubt too the indigenous Christians did not 
 escape their attention, although by this time the 
 Christians of Africa had developed many peculiarities 
 which distinguished them from the Western Church. 
 Gibbon asserts that the force of circumstances had 
 driven them to adopt some of the characteristics of 
 the Mohammedans around them. Like their Spanish 
 brethren they submitted to circumcision; they ab- 
 stained from pork and wine and were known as the 
 Mozarabes or adoptive Arabs. They stood in fact 
 halfway between the orthodox Christians and the 
 Moslems around them; in belief they were followers 
 of Christ, but in outward things they had conformed 
 to the rules of Mahomet. It was therefore easy to 
 distinguish them from other Christians living in Africa, 
 and several families of the old African Church were 
 found in Tunis when Charles V. landed there in 1535 2 . 
 Leo the African thus describes the state of affairs in 
 that city about this time 3 : — 
 
 1 Mas Latrie, 130—3. 2 Gibbon, oh. 51. 
 
 3 In Mas Latrie, 528—30. 
 
THE END OF AFRICAN CHRISTIANITY. 241 
 
 "In the suburb near the gate of El Manera is a 
 particular street, which is like another little suburb, 
 in which dwell the ' Christians of Tunis.' They are 
 employed as the guard of the Sultan and on some 
 other special duties. In the suburb near the sea-gate, 
 Bab-el-Baar (on the side of the Goulette), live the 
 foreign Christian merchants, such as the Venetians, 
 the Genoese, and the Catalans. There are all their 
 shops and their own houses, separated from those of 
 the Moors.'' 
 
 A most careful distinction was evidently drawn 
 between the ' Christians of Tunis ' and the merchants 
 from Europe. The former have their special quarters, 
 as in eastern cities all nationalities do, but they are 
 allowed to live near the Moors ; on the other hand the 
 merchants are necessary to the trade of the city and 
 must therefore be tolerated ; but they are kept as near 
 the edge of the town and as far from their Mohammedan 
 neighbours as possible. The ' Christians of Tunis ' 
 were neither settlers from Europe nor renegades, but for 
 the most part at any rate were the direct descendants 
 of the great African Church. They performed special 
 and honourable duties, and were allowed to exercise 
 their religion unmolested in a chapel of their own. 
 
 However the end soon came. In 1583 the Turks, 
 long masters of Algiers and Tlemcen, took Tunis and 
 dethroned Mohammed, the last of the Aben-Hafis. The 
 new conquerors were fanatical haters of Christianity, 
 and all who refused to embrace Mohammedanism were 
 in deadly peril from them. Their violence was chiefly 
 directed against the native Christians, and while the 
 foreigners were too useful or too well protected to be 
 H. 16 
 
242 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 persecuted to death, the poor remnant of the African 
 Church was forced to apostatize or die 1 . 
 
 The last blow had fallen, and by the end of the 
 sixteenth century the great Church of Tertullian, 
 Cyprian, and Augustine had at length passed from the 
 face of the earth. It was not extinguished without 
 a struggle, and the vitality it had displayed for nearly 
 a thousand years of oppression was worthy of the noble 
 names with which it is inseparably associated. But 
 now at last its long history was over and the fertile 
 fields of North Africa were given up to the yoke of 
 Islam, under which for the most part they remain to 
 this day. 
 
 1 Mas Latrie, 538—30. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Conclusion. 
 
 The Christian Churches of North Africa were 
 founded about the end of the first century; for six 
 hundred years they played an important, at times the 
 most important part, in the development of Western 
 Christianity, and were then crushed almost completely 
 by the overwhelming force of the Mohammedan in- 
 vasion, although a remnant still survived for nine 
 centuries. 
 
 During their fifteen centuries of existence they 
 experienced the most varied fortunes. For two cen- 
 turies they had to struggle for life, as all other Christian 
 communities struggled, against the forces of a State- 
 established paganism; like other Churches they tri- 
 umphed, and to them, as to others, the accession of 
 Constantine promised peace. But now they were 
 exposed to the attacks of a more insidious foe. Within 
 their own ranks Donatism grew up, and the schism 
 which at first merely divided them, threatened to con- 
 quer the Churches which gave it birth. The trouble 
 continued for over a hundred years, but the wisdom of 
 St Augustine, backed by the might of the State, forced 
 
 16—2 
 
244 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 the sectaries to return or to leave the Church un- 
 molested, and again there seemed every hope of peace. 
 Once more their expectations were shattered ; this time a 
 foreign and heretical foe attacked the African Christians, 
 and for a century they languished under the tyranny of 
 half-civilized Arians. The arms of Belisarius restored 
 the supremacy of the Province in temporal matters to 
 the Empire, in spiritual matters to the Catholic Church, 
 and for the next hundred and fifty years African Christi- 
 anity was subject to no trials which an earnest faith 
 could not hope to overcome. But in the seventh 
 century the final misfortune overtook Africa, and the 
 Province fell a victim to the resistless onslaught of the 
 Moslem conquerors ; the secular power of the Empire 
 was for ever swept away, the Roman population was 
 dispersed, and the Church was broken up and forced 
 to seek what shelter it could. 
 
 To all appearance the Churches of Africa were now 
 totally destroyed, but in spite of everything Christianity 
 shewed a marvellous and unparalleled tenacity in its 
 hold on the Province. For nine hundred years the 
 Faith in Christ was handed down from father to son, 
 and the Apostolic Succession was kept up with only 
 occasional help from more favoured communions, in 
 the heart of one of the most fanatically Mohammedan 
 communions of the world. 
 
 Such a record as this would command admiration if 
 African Christianity had concerned itself merely with 
 its own people. Few other Churches can claim to have 
 endured for six hundred years a constant succession of 
 attacks from within and persecutions from without • 
 but fewer still can boast that they have kept the flame 
 
CONCLUSION. 245 
 
 of Faith alive for nearly one thousand years, sur- 
 rounded on all sides by bitter and unrelenting foes. 
 But the Churches of Africa have still other claims to 
 veneration. As long as their organization was com- 
 plete, they played a worthy part in the controversies 
 that agitated the early Christians, and whenever the 
 orthodoxy of the world was in doubt, Africa was always 
 found on the side of the right. At various times 
 and with varying measures of success, Novatianism, 
 Donatism, Pelagianism, Manichaeism, and Arianism, 
 obtained a footing in the Province, but all alike were 
 checked and forced to withdraw in confusion. In the 
 controversy about the Three Chapters and in the 
 repulse of the Monothelites the voice of Africa was 
 heard with no uncertain sound, and the exposure of 
 the errors of Pelagius was largely due to the vigour 
 and zeal of St Augustine. The Christians of Carthage 
 in fact formed one of the most influential and orthodox 
 communions of the early Church, and they did much 
 to fix the doctrines of Christianity as we know them, 
 and to settle the canon in its present form. 
 
 Yet the Churches of Africa are no more, and the 
 causes of their fall present a problem of the utmost 
 interest. Unfortunately it can no longer be fully and 
 certainly solved, for the destructiveness of the Saracens 
 has swept away nearly all the records of the most 
 critical time in their history ; but some guesses may be 
 made from the knowledge that has survived of their 
 earlier years. 
 
 Three tests may be applied to discover the sound- 
 ness of any communion. Orthodoxy of doctrine, per- 
 sonal piety, and efficient organization are necessary 
 
246 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 for the well-being of a Church ; but in none of these 
 can the Africans be said to have been disastrously 
 wanting. Indeed, as far as their teaching was con- 
 cerned, they were more orthodox than Rome itself, and 
 they offered a more prompt and stedfast resistance to 
 the errors of Pelagius and the quibbles of Justinian 
 than did the Popes themselves. 
 
 The personal piety and sound learning of individual 
 members of the African Church are as easily proved. 
 The names of Cyprian and Augustine stand out from 
 their fellows throughout the world, and some less well- 
 known Africans are worthy to be classed with them. 
 The devotion of Deogratias and Eugenius won the 
 respect even of the Vandals ; the influence of Ful- 
 gentius filled the monasteries; the piety of Quod- 
 vultdeus procured for him the dignity of an Abbat at 
 Rome. The details of the last years of the Church 
 are too obscure to enable the list to be continued, 
 but the courage of Reparatus at Constantinople and 
 the trust of the great Gregory in Columbus do not 
 bespeak any falling off from the high standard of the 
 first few centuries ; and the devotion that could 
 support the Christians after the Saracen invasion was 
 certainly of no poorer quality than that shewn by their 
 forefathers, when exposed to the spasmodic rage of the 
 heretical Vandals. 
 
 With the organization and discipline of the Church 
 there was not much amiss. It is true that the various 
 dioceses were not quite so closely knit as in some other 
 countries, and that various important points were at 
 first left to be settled by individual bishops instead of 
 the Church as a whole ; and it is true that, however it 
 
CONCLUSION. 247 
 
 may have worked practically, theoretically the mode of 
 choosing a Primate was wrong. But still, taking it all 
 in all, its ecclesiastical system suited Africa, and re- 
 mained vigorous and strong as long as the Province 
 remained under the Roman power. Indeed the African 
 Christians once or twice proved themselves able to go 
 behind the strict law and, casting aside its letter, to 
 act effectively upon its spirit. During the Vandal per- 
 secution, whenever there was a short breathing-space, 
 the Catholics set their house in order without regarding 
 the regular limits of the dioceses or caring whether 
 they encouraged the pretensions of Rome. Still more 
 striking are the events of the contest with the Mono- 
 thelites. The action of Fortunatus threatened to 
 mislead the whole Church, and to prevent the Pro- 
 consular province in particular from expressing its true 
 opinion. In this crisis had the Church shewn no power 
 of adapting her course of action to the times, the result 
 must have been either a misrepresentation of the views 
 of an important section on a vital point, or a disorderly 
 revolt against lawfully-constituted authority. Happily 
 the Bishops of Proconsularis were able to shake them- 
 selves free from hidebound customs and to break the 
 law in order to preserve the law. Gulosus, Bishop of 
 Pupit, called a convention of his colleagues, and with 
 them decreed the deposition of Fortunatus and the 
 condemnation of the doctrines of the Monothelites. An 
 occurrence such as this, in which the law was invoked 
 to do that which it did not contemplate, and an un- 
 constitutional act was performed in perfect accord with 
 the best constitutional principles, speaks volumes for 
 the reality of the discipline of the African Church. It 
 
248 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 took place within fifty years of the extinction of the 
 Christians of Africa as an organized body, and it seems 
 to make the causes of that extinction all the harder to 
 understand. 
 
 If the African Church right up to the time when 
 its records cease can stand the threefold test, and can 
 be proved orthodox in doctrine, pure in life, and sound 
 in system, the reason of its fall must be found outside 
 its religious life. One fact at once stands out when 
 the history of the Province as a whole is regarded. 
 African Christianity practically fell with the Imperial 
 power and left but few traces behind. Now this coin- 
 cidence points to a connexion between the two, and 
 the previous life of the Province confirms the sup- 
 position. Twice before had the rule of Rome received 
 severe shocks, once from the Moors and once from the 
 Vandals, and in both cases had the Catholics been sub- 
 jected to bitter persecutions. In the days of Firmus 
 and Gildo, the Donatists had been triumphant ; in the 
 time of the Vandals the Arians had ridden roughshod 
 over the orthodox ; and now that the Saracens held all 
 Africa, the Christians once more fell on evil days. 
 
 But there was this difference between the peril of 
 Christianity in the eighth and in the fourth and fifth 
 centuries ; it was not so much a persecution as an 
 extinction of the Faith ; the time was no longer one of 
 noble martyrs and heroic confessors ; there were hardly 
 any Christians to be found. The Church had gradually 
 dwindled away with the Roman population ; as the 
 borders of the Province had been gradually pushed 
 back by the pressure of the Moors, the territories of 
 the Church had grown smaller too. Year by year and 
 
CONCLUSION. 249 
 
 century by century the arm of Rome had lost its strength 
 and had become less and less able to defend the outlying 
 districts of its dominions. Raid after raid had swept 
 over the most fertile plains of North Africa, and in the 
 mountainous parts of Mauritania independent Berber 
 kingdoms had been set up. The fortunes of the Church 
 had suffered with those of the State, and as the eagle 
 had been slowly driven back, the Cross had been com- 
 pelled to retire. 
 
 For on the whole the Christianity had gained but 
 little hold on the Moors. It was strongest in the 
 eastern or more civilized districts ; but its foothold in 
 Mauritania was never firm and in the end was lost 
 altogether. It is true that some of the Bishops, as 
 Quodvultdeus, Deogratias, etc. seem to have borne 
 assumed names, and may therefore be those of men of 
 Moorish origin ; but these prelates probably came from 
 the people of mixed blood, who lived in the interior 
 and formed a connecting link between the Romans 
 and the Moors. Amongst the pure Berber tribes there 
 are hardly any traces of Christianity. Belisarius is 
 said to have converted some who were known as the 
 " Pacati," and Gennadius was praised by Gregory for 
 his missionary efforts; but at other times the Moors 
 are mentioned only as the enemies and persecutors of 
 all Christian believers. 
 
 It was not so much Christianity as the mode of its 
 presentation that repelled the Berbers. The mar- 
 vellous survival of some form of Faith amongst the 
 fanatical Mussulmans could only have been due to the 
 Moors and Moorish resolution ; for the Roman popula- 
 tion had been dispersed or slain, so the only Christians 
 
250 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 in Africa besides the captives from European countries 
 must have sprung from the Moorish stock. The tenacity 
 shewn in those centuries of trial was a distinctive trait 
 of the Berber nature, and there is something very 
 characteristic in the way in which that small remnant 
 elung to Christianity in spite of all persecution and 
 oppression. It is to be lamented that the Church in 
 its prime had never managed to secure all this devotion 
 for itself; if it had, the history of the Province and 
 even of the world might have been different. The 
 line dividing the Romans from the Moors would have 
 been obliterated ; the peoples would have been united ; 
 the Province would have been strengthened and a 
 united front presented to the Saracen hordes. 
 
 This might have happened and at one time ap- 
 peared almost likely to happen, but the uncompromising 
 attitude of African Christianity nipped the first promise 
 of Moorish Christianity in the bud. The Berber cha- 
 racter was narrow but strong. Seizing upon certain 
 vital principles of doctrine, it disregarded the rest and 
 was prepared to sacrifice everything rather than give 
 way in the matters on which it had pinned its faith. 
 Extreme veneration for personal piety, separation from 
 all weaker brethren and fierce intoleration were the 
 principal marks of its religion. When the Moors were 
 Christians they honoured martyrs and confessors with 
 unmeasured admiration ; when they were Moham- 
 medans they paid more respect to their local saints 
 than to the Prophet himself; and in these latter days 
 the rise of the Mahdi and other Moorish seers proves 
 that their character is still the same. Such men as 
 these would accept Christianity after their own fashion 
 
CONCLUSION. 251 
 
 and no other, and most unfortunately for the chance 
 of spreading the Faith in Africa the doctrines that 
 appealed to them were not compatible with the spirit 
 of the rest of the Christian Church. Twice within 
 fifty years were there attempts to force the African 
 communion into a policy of intolerant puritanism and 
 bitter exclusiveness, and both the Novatians and 
 Donatists declared it impossible for the saints to hold 
 converse with sinners. In the second case, at any rate, 
 this narrowness attracts profoundly the uncivilized 
 element in the provincial population, and the origin of 
 Donatism shews how greatly its career was affected by 
 the national characteristics of the Moors. 
 
 It arose in Numidia, one of the least Romanized 
 parts of the Province ; it was favoured by the Berber 
 leaders, Firmus and Gildo ; it was supported by half- 
 barbarian bands of fanatical Circumcelliones ; many of 
 its followers could speak Punic alone. The district 
 of its birth, the nationality of its political leaders, the 
 savagery of its rank and file and their ignorance of 
 Latin bespeak a large uncivilized non-Roman element. 
 Its practical suppression by St Augustine and its 
 partial revival in the days of Gregory point to the 
 same conclusion. As soon as the forces of Catholicism 
 and Imperialism were marshalled against it, the once 
 all-powerful organization disappeared from the more 
 civilized districts of Africa ; the spiritual and temporal 
 power of Rome triumphed and not one word of the 
 sectaries is heard for nearly two centuries. Then there 
 is a fresh outbreak and in the very quarter where it 
 might have been expected. Not in Roman Carthage 
 or well-settled Byzacene, but in the West, in the 
 
252 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 mountainous regions of Numidia and Mauritania the 
 old trouble crops up again. 
 
 This revival, moreover, has certain peculiar circum- 
 stances connected with it. If the western bishops had 
 been affected by the Donatist errors, it would have 
 followed the ordinary lines of heresies and schisms; 
 but at first, as far as the scanty records make anything 
 clear, the higher ecclesiastics seem to have opposed 
 the new teachings. The laity forced the bishops to 
 accept the schismatical doctrines and were prepared to 
 use violence to oust the Catholic clergy from their 
 cures in favour of sectarians. The whole of Numidia 
 was affected by the Donatist teaching, and the pro- 
 vincial synod could not be relied on to decide ecclesias- 
 tical questions according to the canons of the Church 
 and the traditions of the Fathers; while in Procon- 
 sularis the episcopate were still so hostile to this per- 
 verted form of belief that it forgot moderation and 
 wisdom in its anger. 
 
 The ultimate fate of Donatism is quite unknown ; 
 but if it be admitted that this type of Christianity 
 attracted the Moors as much as it repelled the Romans, 
 an unexpected conclusion must follow from the circum- 
 stances of the extinction of the Churches of Africa. 
 The ruin of Donatism was the destruction of the one 
 chance of perpetuating Christianity in North Africa. 
 Tn the first place it prevented the building of the most 
 efficient of all bridges between the Romans and the 
 Moors ; in the second place it weakened the Christians 
 in numbers where they were strongest in tenacity. 
 The wonderful fact of the survival of the Faith 
 through nine hundred years of oppression cannot be 
 
CONCLUSION. 253 
 
 overrated, and the few bare facts that reveal its 
 existence stand for numberless instances of heroic 
 fortitude that have now been forgotten. If the Church 
 had only succeeded in getting hold of the great mass 
 of the Berber tribes, if it could only have enlisted under 
 the banner of Christ all the enthusiasm that afterwards 
 supported the cause of Islam, it might well have been 
 that not only would the Saracens have never succeeded 
 in crushing African Christianity after the conquest of 
 the Province, but they might never have conquered 
 the Province at all. As it was, the teaching which 
 appealed strongly to the Berber mind was condemned by 
 the leaders of the Church as imperfect, and those who 
 taught and believed it were subject to the ban of the 
 ecclesiastical and secular authorities. It was un- 
 doubtedly corrupt and it could not be reconciled with 
 the spirit or much of the letter of the pure Gospel; 
 still the faults of the Moors were those of their 
 qualities, and if they had not been so fanatically nar- 
 row it may be doubted whether they would have shewn 
 such marvellous resolution. 
 
 As far as our records go, the causes of the extinction 
 of the Churches of North Africa may be stated as 
 follows. They fell because they were the Churches 
 of a party and not of a people ; they appealed to the 
 civilized Romans alone, and not to the barbarian 
 Moors. Circumstances forced them to assume a hostile 
 and uncompromising attitude towards the form of 
 Christianity adopted by the Moors, and their life was 
 bound up with that of the Roman domination in the 
 Province. From the time of the Vandals this had 
 been gradually weakened and its territories had been 
 
254 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 steadily diminished; the alien population in Africa 
 had decreased and with it the numbers of the Church. 
 When the Saracen invasion came the Romanized in- 
 habitants fled, and like the Jews of old were spread 
 over the face of the world ; as the Roman community 
 dispersed, the Church dispersed and the disintegration 
 of the Imperial power meant the disintegration of the 
 ecclesiastical system also. Some few Christians re- 
 mained when their brethren were gone, and these man- 
 aged to preserve their separate existence with occasional 
 help from more prosperous communions. Probably 
 Moorish by blood, they display a marvellous resolution, 
 and at times were even able to defy their persecutors ; 
 but their numbers were too small for them ever to 
 become a lasting power, and in 1 583 the Turks swept 
 away for ever the last vestiges of the Church of Africa 
 which still existed in the land made famous by the 
 labours of Cyprian and Augustine. 
 
 It may be that the Catholics made a mistake in 
 altogether refusing to countenance or adopt the methods 
 of Donatism; probably their policy was dictated by 
 the theological and political necessities of the time; 
 but there can be no doubt that the African Churches 
 were destroyed not because of their failings, not because 
 they were corrupt, but because they failed to reach the 
 hearts of the true natives of the Province. The system 
 of Rome, the doctrines of Rome, the virtues of Rome 
 were those of a civilized law-abiding nation ; the system, 
 the doctrines, and the virtues of the Moors were those 
 of a barbarian and savage people. Both had their 
 strong points and both their weaknesses ; if the Moors 
 were narrow and fanatical, they were faithful to the 
 
CONCLUSION. 255 
 
 heart's core ; if the Romans were unbending and un- 
 accommodating, they were blinded to the needs of their 
 country by the troubles of the whole Church. But as 
 it was, the Church in Africa as an organization was 
 sure to disappear, not because its members fell away, 
 but because they were dispersed, and when the foreign 
 population of the Province was gone, there were hardly 
 any Christians left to carry on in Africa the life of the 
 alien Church of its former rulers. 
 
AUTHORS AND WORKS QUOTED. 
 
 Abbott, Dr Evelyn Philomythus. 
 
 St Augustine , Letters and Works. 
 
 Benson, Abp Cyprian. His life. His times. His 
 
 work. 
 
 Beveridge "SwoBlkov sive Pandectae Canonum. 
 
 Bingham Dictionary of Christian Antiquities. 
 
 Boissier, Gaston L Afrique Romaine. 
 
 „ „ Le Fin du Paganisme. 
 
 Bright Select Anti-Pelagian Epistles of St 
 
 Augustine. 
 
 Bury Fragments. 
 
 „ History of Later Roman Empire. 
 
 Cagnat, Ren£ LArmee Romaine d' Afrique. 
 
 Cassiodorus Chronicle. 
 
 „ Variae. 
 
 Chronicon Paschale. 
 
 Claudian De Bello Gildonico. 
 
 Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum. 
 
 Coulanges, Fustel de Recherches sur quelques Problemes 
 
 d'Histoire. 
 
 Darras Histoire Generate de l'Eglise. 
 
 El Hakem (translated by Slane). 
 
 El Kairouani (Exploration Scientifique de F Afrique ). 
 
 Encyclopedia Britannica. 
 
 En Noweiri (translated by Slane). 
 
 Finlay Greece under the Romans. 
 
 Fournel Les Berbers. 
 
 H. 17 
 
258 THE CHEISTIAN CHURCHES IN NOETH AFRICA. 
 
 Freeman, E. A English Historical Review, July 1887. 
 
 Fulgentii Sanoti Vita. 
 
 Garner Dissertation on African Synods. 
 
 Gibbon Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. 
 
 Gregory I Letters. 
 
 Gregory II Letters. 
 
 Gregory VII Letters. 
 
 Gregory of Tours Historia Franoorum. 
 
 Hefele History of the Councils of the Church. 
 
 Hodgkin, T Cassiodorus' Variae. 
 
 „ Italy and her Invaders. 
 
 Ibn Khaldoun (translated by Slane). 
 
 Idatius Chronicle. 
 
 Isidorus Hispalensis Chronicle. 
 
 , , , , Historia Vandalorum . 
 
 John Biclarensis Chronicle. 
 
 Jornandes De Rebus Geticis. 
 
 Justinian Laws. 
 
 Lecky History of European Morals. 
 
 Leo I Letters. 
 
 Marcellinus Comes Chronicle. 
 
 Marcus Histoire des "Wandales. 
 
 Mas Latrie, Le Comte de Relations et Commerce de l'Afrique Sep- 
 tentrionale. 
 
 Mercier Histoire de l'Afrique. 
 
 Milman Latin Christianity. 
 
 Mommsen Roman Provinces from Caesar to Dio- 
 cletian. 
 
 Morcelli Africa Christiana. 
 
 Miinter Primordia Ecclesiae Africanae. 
 
 Neander Church History. 
 
 Papencordt Geschichte der Vandalen. 
 
 Plinius Opera. 
 
 Possidius De Promissionibus. 
 
 „ Vita Sancti Augustini EpiscojM. 
 
 Procopius Anecdota. 
 
 „ De Aedificiis. 
 
 „ De Bello Vandalico. 
 
AUTHORS AND WORKS QUOTED. 259 
 
 Prosper Chronicle. 
 
 Prosper Tyro Chronicle (Canisii Antiquae Lectiones). 
 
 Ruinart Historia Persecutionis Vandalorum. 
 
 Salvian De Gubernatione Dei. 
 
 Smith, Dr W Dictionary of Christian Antiquities. 
 
 „ Dictionary of Christian Biography. 
 
 Theodosius Laws. 
 
 Theophanes Chronicle. 
 
 Tissot, Charles Geographie comparee de province ro- 
 
 maine d'Afrique. 
 
 Victor Tunnonensis Chronicle. 
 
 Victor Vitensis De Persecutione Vandalorum. 
 
 A useful list of works upon Africa is to be found in 
 Ashbee Bibliography of Tunis. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Amalafrida, marriage, 152-3 ; 
 revolt and death, 162 
 
 Antalas, 161, 170, 173 
 
 Army, 17, 79; reorganization by 
 Justinian, 175-6 ; Foederati 
 and Limitanei, 17 
 
 Augustine, St, of Hippo, 30; op- 
 position to Donatists, 50-1; 
 58-62,65; death, 80-1 
 
 Aurasius, Mount, 7; captured by- 
 Moors, 120; by Solomon, 171; 
 by Saracens, 218 
 
 Boniface, Bishop of Carthage, 
 
 159, 177 
 Boniface, Count of Africa, 71-4, 
 
 80-1 
 
 Caelestis, 30 
 
 Cahina, 221, 223-4 
 
 Carthage, captured; by Vandals, 
 82 ; by Belisarius 163 ; by 
 Saracens, 221-2 
 
 Carthage Conferences, with Dona- 
 tists, 411, 63-4; with Arians, 
 484, 130-4; reorganization of 
 Church, 535, 177-81 
 
 Church, African, origin and date, 
 22-3 ; characteristics, 25-6 ; 
 reverence for saints and mar- 
 tyrs, 38-9 ; growth, 27-37 ; 
 clergy, 30-6; celibacy, 33-4; 
 synods, 37-8 ; diocesan system, 
 39-42, 159-60, 181, 194-5, 
 
 245-8; primates, 41-2, 181, 
 194-5; relations with Alexan- 
 dria, 24-7, 42-4, 230; relations 
 with Rome, 23-4, 42-4, 103-4, 
 196-8, 207, 234-6 ; reorganiza- 
 tion under Justinian, 176-82 ; 
 readmission of penitents, 146, 
 150, 177-9 ; monasteries and 
 Bishops, 160-1, 180; restora- 
 tion of property, etc., 181 ; pro- 
 gress, 187, 191-2 ; discipline in 
 time of Gregory I., 194-9; 
 under the Saracens, 225-30; 
 appeal to Jacobite Patriarch of 
 Alexandria, 230 ; appeal to 
 Borne, 234-6; causes of fall, 
 248-55. See also Donatists, 
 Maniclieans, Monothelites, No- 
 vatians, Pelagians, Three Chap- 
 ters, Vandal Persecution 
 
 "Christians of Tunis," 240-2 
 
 Circumcelliones, 48, 50, 57, 61, 
 63, 83-5 
 
 Columbus, Bishop in Numidia, 
 196, 198, 203 
 
 Cyprian, St, Bishop of Carthage, 
 28, 44-6, 71 
 
 Cyrila, Arian Patriaroh of Car- 
 thage, 124, 132-4 
 
 Deogratias, Bishop of Carthage, 
 
 109-10 
 Dominicus, Bishop of Carthage, 
 
 192, 198, 199, 202, 206 
 
262 THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES IN NORTH AFRICA. 
 
 Donatists, 44-53 ; political aspect, 
 47-9; economic and social 
 aspect, 49, 56-7 ; excesses, 56-7, 
 59; St Augustine's opposition, 
 50-1, 58-62, 65 ; edicts against, 
 50, 57, 63-5 ; conference at 
 Carthage, 411, 63^1; downfall, 
 63-6; relations with Vandals, 
 83-5 ; reappearance, 200-3 ; 
 effect on African Christianity, 
 250-3. See also Circumeel- 
 liones 
 
 Eugenius, Bishop of Carthage, 
 123-4, 130; exile, 139-40; 
 return, 149; death, 157 
 
 Firmus, 49, 55 
 
 Fulgentius, St, Bishop of Ruspe, 
 95, 140, 148, 160 ; monastic life, 
 150-1 ; consecration, 155-6 ; 
 exile, 157 ; summoned to Car- 
 thage, 157-8 
 
 Gaiseric, character, 77-8; settle- 
 ment of Africa, 90-6; con- 
 spiracy against, 97 ; expedi- 
 tions, 82, 98 ; sacks Rome, 98- 
 9; peace with East and West, 
 101,117; policy towards Catho- 
 lics, 101-18; attitude towards 
 officials, 92, 113-4, 115; death, 
 117 
 
 Gelimer, usurps, 162; conquered 
 by Belisarius, 163 
 
 Gennadius, Praetorian Prefect, 
 190, 194-5, 201-4 
 
 Gildo, 49, 55 
 
 Gregory I., Pope, 192-203 
 
 Gregory II., Pope, 203 
 
 Gregory VII., Pope, 234-6 
 
 Gregory, Prefect, revolt and 
 death, 212-3 
 
 Gunthamund, 14-51; policy to- 
 wards Catholics, 149-51 
 
 Hilderic, 158-62 ; favours Catho- 
 lics, 158-9 ; character, 161 
 
 Hippo, siege, 80-1 
 
 Hunneric, 118-45 ; hostage at 
 Rome, 81-2; marriage, 99; 
 
 international relations, 119 ; 
 religious policy, 120-7, 136-7, 
 143; conference at Carthage, 
 130—4; reissues Theodosian 
 edict, 135-6; exile of clergy, 
 128-9, 139-40, 142; famine 
 and pestilence, 144-5 
 
 Intercessores, 35; dispute con- 
 cerning limits of dioceses, 159- 
 60, 194 
 
 Junta, synods, 523-4, 159-60 
 
 Ko$eila, 216, 219-20 
 
 Leo I., Pope, letter to Bishop of 
 Mauritania, 103-4 
 
 Manicheans, 69-70, 122, 203-4 
 
 Mastigas, 176 
 
 Hasmw, 154 
 
 Maximianists, 51-2, 62 
 
 Maximianus, Bishop of Bagai, 
 60-1 
 
 Monasteries, 150-1 ; relations 
 withBishops, 160-1, 180 ; slack 
 discipline, 199 
 
 Monothelites, 206-9 
 
 Mont Cassim, monks of, 237-8 
 
 Moors, origin, 5; civilization, 9; 
 religious character, 16; attacks 
 on Provinces, 70-4, 120, 148-9, 
 153, 170-4, 190, 204; relations 
 with Gaiseric, 85; independent 
 kingdoms of Masuna, 154, 
 Mastigas, 176; "Pacati," 176; 
 resist Saracens under Koeeila, 
 216, 219-20, Cahina, 221, 223- 
 4; join Saracens, 224; conver- 
 sion to Mohammedanism, 249- 
 53 
 
 Mornak, 231 
 
 Notitia of Africa under the Sara- 
 cens, 232-3 
 Novatians, 44-6 
 
 Pelagians, 66-8 
 
 Province, boundaries, 4-7; popu- 
 lation, 4-9 ; insecurity, 8, 14- 
 
INDEX. 
 
 263 
 
 5; civilization, 10-21, 32, 
 168-9; army, 17-8; language, 
 18-20; relations with Egypt, 
 24-5 ; government, 168-9 ; 
 reorganization by Justinian, 
 170-6, 186-9 ; state in 600, 205-6 
 
 Beparatus, Bishop of Carthage, 
 
 177, 182, 184 
 Bogatists, 51 
 Borne, sack of, 98-9, 109-10 
 
 Saracens, Invasion by Zobeir, 
 642, 213-4 ; raids, 661-8, 215 ; 
 founding of Kairouan by Okba, 
 669, 216 ; expedition of Abou- 
 el-Mohadjer, 672, 216 ; Okba's 
 march to Atlantic and death, 
 681, 218-9; Zoheir-ben-kais, 
 expedition, retreat and death, 
 688, 219-20; Hassan-ibn-en- 
 Noman-el-Ghassani, 697, cap- 
 ture of Carthage, 221-2; con- 
 flict with Cahina, 223-4; 
 Mouea-ben-Noceir, 224-5 ; ra- 
 vages, 218, 220-4 ; fate of Pro- 
 vincials, 225-8; fate of Chris- 
 tians, 229^42 ; Mohammedan 
 rule, 227-42 
 
 Sebastian, 82, 115 
 
 Tertullian, 22, 27-8 
 
 Thrasamund, 151-8 ; character, 
 152 ; foreign alliances, 152-3 ; 
 religious policy, 154-8 
 
 Three Chapters, controversy of, 
 183-6 
 
 Tyconius, 51 
 
 Vandals, 76-167; invasion 76-85 ; 
 ravages, 85-90 ; puritanism, 86- 
 7; settlement of Africa, 90-6; 
 rule of succession, 96-7 ; expe- 
 ditions against, 82, 100; state 
 under Hunneric, 119 ; under 
 Thrasamund, 151-3 ; fall, 163, 
 169-70 ; attitude towards 
 Catholics, 163-7 
 
 Vandal Persecution, during con- 
 quest, 85-90; under Gaiseric, 
 101-8, 110-17; toleration by 
 Gaiseric, 108-10, 117; tolera- 
 tion by Hunneric, 120-4 ; per- 
 secution by Hunneric, 125-44 ; 
 by Gunthamund, 149; tolera- 
 tion by Gunthamund, 149-51; 
 oppressions by Thrasamund, 
 154-8; favour of Hilderic, 158- 
 9 ; attitude of Gelimer, 162-3 ; 
 summary, 163-7 
 
 Victor Vitensis, credibility as an 
 historian, 89-90 
 
 Zeno, 117, 123 
 
 CAMBRIDGE: PRINTED BY J. AND C. F. CLAY AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.