HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE MIDDLE AGES - Julian Emperor

128 THOMAS J. HEFFERNANthe narratives of the martyrs are written over a period of two centuriesin different languages and from regions as different as Thessalonicain Greece and Cirta in Africa they share similar narrativestructures, rhetoric, and theology.Central to all the martyr stories is the use of the trial transcript(commentarius) of the actual trial (cognitio extra ordinem). The transcriptprovided—whether a fabrication of the actual trial or an eyewitnessaccount—the text with three essential elements: a display of the heroismof the martyr; the cruelty of the inquisitor; and the bankruptcyof the Roman system. The cognitio was an expedient way to handlemalefactors and was used only during the empire. Under the provisosof the cognitio, the local official who presided could initiate legalaction by summoning the litigants and appointing himself as judge.Ironically, this piece of purely expedient legislation was to providethe Acta a unifying and dramatic focus. Aside from the obvious useof the commentarius to provide historical legitimacy, the cognitio—sinceit allowed the prosecutor to serve as summoner, judge, and jury—provided authors of the Acta with a vehicle to display the martyr inintellectual debate with the single representative of the state. Afterthe age of historical persecution had passed, the inquisitional, testingaspect of the cognitio and commentarius was retained in hagiographicnarratives. Moreover, the figure of the corrupt and cruel Romanjurist in dialogue with the saint was to evolve into a demon-like persecutor.The commentarius is prominent even in the earliest Acta. In theMartyrdom of Polycarp (ca. 156–59) the governor himself is the judge:Governor: “Swear by the emperor’s genius”!Polycarp: “If you delude yourself into thinking that I will swear bythe emperor’s genius, as you say, and if you pretend not to know whoI am, listen and I will tell you plainly: I am a Christian/XristianÒwefimi”. 31This interchange shows the pattern that was to become a formulain the Acta. The judge asks the accused to swear by the emperor’sgenius, the Christian refuses, often with a stinging rebuke, and thenpronounces what became a ritual part of the commentarius, the declarationof the name “I am a Christian/XristianÒw efimi”. The dia-31Acts of the Christian Martyrs, 10–11.