Sophia Scriptura

Church History 8.14.1

Eusebius of Caesarea · Church History · ca. 300–325 · Caesarea · Read in context

Summary: Maxentius, tyrant at Rome, at first pretended favor to the Christian faith and halted persecution to win popularity.

Greek text · Dindorf 4:372

Τούτου παῖς Μαξέντιος, ὁ τὴν ἐπὶ Ῥῴμης τυραννίδα συστησάμενος, ἀρχόμενος μὲν τὴν καθʼ ἡμᾶς πίστιν ἐπʼ ἀρεσκείᾳ καὶ κολακείᾳ τοῦ δήμου Ῥωμαίων καθυπεκρίνατο, ταύτῃ τε τοῖς ὑπηκόοις τὸν κατὰ Χριστιανῶν ἀνεῖναι προστάττει διωγμὸν, εὐσέβειαν ἐπιμορφάζων, ὡς ἂν δεξιὸς καὶ πολὺ πρᾶος παρὰ τοὺς προτέρους φανείη·

English · Claude translation

His son Maxentius, who established the tyranny at Rome, at first feigned our faith to please and flatter the Roman people. Accordingly he ordered his subjects to relax the persecution against the Christians, putting on a show of piety so that he might appear gracious and far milder than his predecessors.

About this passage

Source
Dindorf 4:372 · Wilhelm Dindorf, ed., Eusebii Caesariensis Opera, vol. 4: Historiae ecclesiasticae libri I–X (Leipzig: Teubner, 1871) · Greek text: W. Dindorf, Eusebii Caesariensis Opera 4 (Leipzig: Teubner, 1871), digitized by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin), CC BY-SA 4.0
Text
As printed in Dindorf, Eusebii Opera 4. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; no textual problem is noted in this passage.
Translation
Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-27 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Dindorf, Eusebii Caesariensis Opera 4 (Teubner, 1871); made independently of existing English translations.
Compare
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, vol. 1 (1890) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made)
Topics
Persecution

Notes

Notes on the original text

  • Digital text corrected (Latin letters and a misread vowel in the digital text): Ma ξίντιος → Μαξέντιος.

Cite this passage

Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 8.14.1 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/eusebius-historia/8/14/1/).

Plain text
Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 8.14.1 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/eusebius-historia/8/14/1/).

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