122 remembering constantine at the milvian bridge

from talking with soldiers and officials at the emperor’s court at Trier.
Most likely Constantine himself had not been a source for Lactantius’
description of the battle, the emperor’s dream, or other events from
the emperor’s life. Instead, the relationship may have been reversed,
and Lactantius’ books, both Institutes and Deaths, may have influenced
Constantine and his later memories of these events. In fact, Lactan-
tius himself might have been a direct source for Constantine’s later
memories.
Already early in his reign Constantine had shown an interest in
philosophical and theological arguments. Studying Lactantius’ treatises
was perhaps a difficult project, however. Even a learned bishop of
Rome subsequently grumbled about reading them. In his estimation,
the books were far too long, “thousands of lines,” and there were too
many erudite digressions about metrics, geography, and philosophy that
were suited only for other scholars. But perhaps Lactantius had used
his Institutes as the basis for a series of public lectures at Constantine’s
court at Trier. Crispus would have listened as a student, and the emperor
perhaps as an interested auditor. As a result, in a letter to bishops in
North Africa written in the late summer of 314, Constantine seems
to have recycled some of the ideas that Lactantius had highlighted in
Institutes about disobedience to God. If Lactantius were still at Trier
while he was writing Deaths, then through reading or through listening
to orations, Constantine may likewise have become familiar with his
account of events in both East and West, including the battle at the
Milvian Bridge and the civil war between Maximinus and Licinius.32

32
Complaints of Damasus: Jerome, Ep. 35.2. After a friend asked him to compose a condensed
version of Institutes, even Lactantius conceded that he should “compress the digressions
and abbreviate the verbosity”: see Lactantius, Epitome divinarum institutionum praef. 1.
Constantine’s letter: apud Optatus, Appendix 5, with Digeser (1994), (2000) 170–71, for an
excellent argument that Lactantius’ philosophy had influenced this letter, and Chapter 7,
discussing the context after the council at Arles. Lactantius’ ideas may also have influenced
Constantine’s Oration to the Saints, in particular the emperor’s interest in Virgil and the
Sibylline oracles: see De Decker (1978) 80–81, Guillaumin (1978) 197, “Ce Discours aura
été rédigé par l’empereur à partir d’un canevas fourni par Lactance,” and Lane Fox (1986)
658–62. Schott (2008) 116–17, suggests that Constantine’s discussion of divine retribution on
wicked emperors (in his Oratio ad sanctorum coetum 24–25) “almost certainly owes something
to Lactantius’s On the Deaths of the Persecutors.”