mountainman

The following is an extract from Arnaldo Momigliano's article
"Pagan and Christian Historiography in the Fourth Century".
(full text is available here.

In this extract, Momigliano refers to a full treatment of 'Devils in
Historiography' was to be reserved for a future course (at the
Warburg Institute) to be entitled "Devils and the Classical Tradition".

Can anyone point me at further articles by Momigliano in which
he provides this "full treatment of 'Devils in Historiography' "?

Here is the context:

Perhaps we have all underestimated the impact of ecclesiastical history on the development of historical method. A new chapter of historiography begins with Eusebius not only because he invented ecclesiastical history, but because he wrote it with a documentation which is utterly different from that of the pagan historians (25).

Thus we are brought back to our main point. Eusebius made history positively and negatively by creating ecclesiastical history and by leaving political history alone. In a comparable manner another Christian invented the biography of the saints and left the biography of generals and politicians to the pagans. The inventor was Athanasius, whose life of St Anthony was promptly made available in Latin by Euagrius. The complicated pattern of suggestions which, lies behind the rise of hagiography - exitus illustrium virorum, Jewish legends, lives of philosophers, ‘aretalogies’, etc. — cannot detain us here. The studies by K. Holl amid R. Reitzenstein seem to have established that Athanasius was more directly inspired by the Pythagorean type of the theios aner, such as we find in the life of Apollonius of Tyana by Philostratus and in the life of Pythagoras himself by Iamblichus (26). Athanasius intended to oppose the Christian saint who works his way to God with the help of God to the pagan philosopher who is practically a god himself. By imparting a mortal blow to the ideal of the pagan philosopher, he managed to produce an ideal type which became extremely popular among ordinary Christians. Only small groups of pagans believed that Pythagoras or Diogenes was the best possible man. The great majority of pagans was more interested in Hercules, Achilles and Alexander the Great. But in Christian society the saint was soon recognized as the only perfect type of man. This gives hagiography, as begun by Athanasius, its unique place. It outclassed all other types of biography because all the other types of men became inferior to that of the saint. In comparison, the ordinary biography of kings and politicians became insignificant. One of the most important features of the lives of saints is to give a new dimension to historiography by registering the activity of devils in the plural. It is no exaggeration to say that a mass invasion of devils into historiography preceded and accompanied the mass invasion of barbarians into the Roman empire. A full treatment of ‘Devils in historiography’ must be reserved for a future course at the Warburg Institute on ‘Devils and the Classical Tradition’. But so much can be said here: the devils seem to have respected the classical distinction of literary genres. They established themselves in biography, but made only occasional irruptions into the field of annals.

mountainman

Does anyone know if Momigliano published this paper?