Gioco di ombre a Costantinopoli. Cassiodoro, papa Vigilio, Giustiniano

Описание: Roma, Istituto italiano per la storia antica
30 aprile 2021
Pierfrancesco Porena

Abstract
Cassiodorus was a senator and politician in Ravenna from 503 to 537/538 in the loyal service of the Ostrogothic kings. He gave up politics between 538 and 540.

In 550 he appears as vir religiosus in the retinue of Pope Vigilius in Constantinople during the dispute over the ‘Three Chapters’ against the emperor Justinian. During that stay he was contacted by the historian Iordanes, who was composing his Getica. Contrary to the opinion of A. Momigliano and some scholars to date, this paper assumes that Cassiodorus abandoned politics for good around 537/538 and that the former dignitary of the Ostrogothic kings placed himself under the tutelage of Pope Vigilius towards the end of the first phase of the Gothic War. In this way he escaped the reprisals of the Byzantines and Ostrogoths.

Cassiodorus had no ambitions of reintegration into the ruling elite and became vir religiosus in the Pope’s retinue, whose strategy he espoused. He followed Vigilius to Constantinople, not as a fugitive, nor as a prisoner, but as a collaborator. In his ‘second life’ Cassiodorus was a supporter of the pope from 539/540 to 554. In Constantinople, Cassiodorus did not help Jordanes in the composition of the Getica and carried out the ambassadorship to the dissident deacons for the pope even though he did not share Vigilius’ doctrinal choice at the time.

After the publication of Justinian’s first edict against the ‘Three Chapters’ (543/545), in preparation for the pope’s mission to Constantinople (547-554), Cassiodorus prepared in Rome the selection of documents that were to become the Collectio Avellana. This was a ‘working’ collection, not one intended for publication. It was assembled to provide the editor with a selection of texts suitable for supporting the dispute with Justinian in Constantinople.

With the return of the defeated pope from Constantinople (554/555), the Collectio lost interest for its author and was neither updated nor published. Cassiodorus retired to Vivarium