Letter 121

From: Unknown correspondent To: Pope Hormisdas, Rome (Anastasia) Date: ~515-523 AD Context: Part of the papal correspondence surrounding the Acacian Schism (484-519), the major breach between Rome and Constantinople over the condemnation of the Monophysite patriarch Acacius. Pope Hormisdas (514-523) worked tirelessly to resolve this schism, which was finally healed in 519 under Emperor Justin I. [This letter is part of the extensive diplomatic correspondence generated by the resolution of the Acacian Schism. The schism had divided the Eastern and Western churches for thirty-five years over the condemnation of Patriarch Acacius of Constantinople, who had promoted a compromise formula (the Henotikon) that Rome rejected as insufficiently orthodox. Hormisdas conducted negotiations through multiple embassies to Constantinople, exchanging letters with emperors, patriarchs, imperial officials, and powerful aristocratic women at court. The correspondence reveals the machinery of late antique ecclesiastical diplomacy: formal theological demands, careful diplomatic language, networks of lay and clerical allies, and the constant anxiety of a pope trying to manage events happening months away by letter.]

^^i^^^ Auastasii imperatoris ad Hormisdam. 16 Jul. * Theopompum comitem domesticot um et Severianum comitem sacri cojuistorii Itgatu p- ponlifici ad sahttationis officium et pacem conciliandam mittit. Anastasius Augustus Hormisdae papae per Theo- pomjium et Severianum viros clarissimos. Omnia, quae benignitas conceperit animorum, dulci ambitu et festinatione laudabili propagantur; nec sibi requiem putant jHisse praestari, donec ad affectum saluberrimum desiderata perduxerint: et tunc quaedam ipsius festinationis fit requies, dum eontigerit spes votorum. Quod in praesenti nos certa ratione pertulimus, donec eoelestis favor et uostrae petitioni aditimi') et vestrae promissionis serenum donet effectum. Ergo quia vel maxima itiueris lougitudo vel ultra solitum niorem hiemalis asperitas, quod optabamus^), nobis fecit incertum, interim intra animos nostros desiderata compressi- mus, beneficia divina captantes, quae b<mae^) exitus rei sua inter- positione decidunt agnoscentes. Igitur, quod ejus pietas primam no])is gratiam condonavit, ut missa^) legatio ad beatitudinem tuam feliciter remearet, ad secundam processimus, ut dirigeretur a uobb promissa^) legatio, per quam et commemoratio fieret eorum, quae nim conatuB, ut ipsum ab Acacii commuiiiouc dimovcrent, oblique culpat ac reprobat. *<) b vestrorum: quod nulla vel auctoritatc vel ratione fulcitur. Quis f«!«— 8i])i in animum inducat, Anastasium legatis apostolicis, quos re infecta dimitte- bat, arcana consilia sua crcdituruni fuissc? Longe est probabiliua nc dicaB certum, cuni dc legatione loqui, quam se missunim ipse nunc promisii, quftmqve in annum sequentcm distulit, ut scquens cpistola fidem faciet. 11 •) b cc auditum, moxque et uUra. Ibi ejus ponitur, quasi antea Dei heneficia dictum esset. '•') Neque etiam promissis hac iu re stetit. Ut enim Hormisda epiit. 23. n. 2 EPISTOLAE 10 — 12. 765 lum sauctissimis viris longa deliberatione contulimus, et inde Deoa. 516. aspice tam nostrae petitionis quam vestrae gratiae ad integrum IX serena resplendeat, et toti orbi gaudia exspectata donentur. oinmemorationis itaque loco et salutationis honorem reddendo, Theo- ompum virum illustrem, comitera domesticorum, agentem saeri Dsi^ri palatii scholam, fidelem nobis vel pro suis raoribus vel pro sa affectione genitali nostrae provinciae, sed et Severianum viruni airissimum comitera sacri nostri consistorii ad vestram direximus ctitatem, qui ordinem litterarum propria voce testantes, ad cele- tem exspectata**) provocent, quae etiam coelesti misericordiae edimus placuisse. Data XVU Cal. Augustas Constantinopoli, Petro ro clarissimo consule.