“A Barbarian by Birth, Yet a Hellene in Everything Else”

Abstract

The Christianisation of the Roman Empire in the 4th-5th centuries led to a blurring of the traditional ethnocultural dichotomy (Barbarians – Romans), and to the emergence of a new type of social division on the basis of religion: pagan – Christian. The present article is devoted to the analysis of the image of a “pious” (pagan) barbarian, formed in Late Antique pagan historiography. The conclusion is made that pagans saw their barbarian coreligionists as the defenders of their faith against the anti-pagan state policy. Comparing pagan barbarians to their fellow Christian tribesmen, they tried to prove that only pagans can be true allies of Rome. Finally, the military successes of the pagan warlords served as evidence of the active participation of the gods in the affairs of their followers and acted as an argument for the preservation of the traditional forms of worship.