The Great Persecution under Diocletian

Eusebius describes the years before the persecution, under Diocletian, as a time of favour: Christians governed provinces and served in the imperial household, and congregations had outgrown their old buildings and were putting up large churches in every city (Eusebius, Church History 8.1.1–6). Lactantius, who taught rhetoric at the emperor’s residence, Nicomedia (Jerome, On Illustrious Men 80), says the change began when Christian attendants made the sign of the cross at a sacrifice and the soothsayers blamed them for its failure. In his account Diocletian then ordered the palace staff and the army to sacrifice, his junior colleague Galerius urged a general persecution through the winter, and an oracle of Apollo decided the matter (Lactantius, Deaths of the Persecutors 10–11).

On 23 February 303, Lactantius relates, officials broke into the church at Nicomedia, burned the Scriptures they found and had the building levelled (Lactantius, Deaths of the Persecutors 12). The edict posted next day, he says, stripped Christians of rank and of the protection of the courts (Lactantius, Deaths of the Persecutors 13). Eusebius gives its other terms: churches were to be razed and the Scriptures burned (Eusebius, Church History 8.2.4–5). Lactantius tells of two fires in the palace within fifteen days and accuses Galerius of having them set; Eusebius mentions a fire and says he does not know how it began. Both say that the Christians were blamed and that members of the household and clergy of the city were put to death (Lactantius, Deaths of the Persecutors 14–15) (Eusebius, Church History 8.6.1–10).

More edicts followed. The clergy everywhere were to be imprisoned and then forced by torture to sacrifice (Eusebius, Church History 8.2.4–5) (Eusebius, Church History 8.6.1–10). In the second year, Eusebius reports from Palestine, a general order required all the people in every city to sacrifice and pour libations (Eusebius, Martyrs of Palestine 3.1).

An official record of the first edict at work is preserved among the papers appended to the work of Optatus. On 19 May 303 the curator of the city of Cirta in Numidia went to “the house in which the Christians were accustomed to assemble” and demanded the Scriptures. The bishop said that the readers had them. The clerk listed what was handed over, chalices of gold and silver, lamps, and stores of clothing, and the search went on from house to house as books were handed over (Optatus, Against the Donatists appendix 2 (Gesta apud Zenophilum), pp. 352–356). Clergy who surrendered the Scriptures in this way were afterwards called traitors, and the charge lay behind the Donatist Schism and the Council of Arles.

Enforcement was uneven. In Gaul the junior emperor Constantius, according to Lactantius, let church buildings be pulled down but harmed no one; Eusebius says he did not even do that (Lactantius, Deaths of the Persecutors 15–16) (Eusebius, Church History 8.13.12–13). Eusebius says that Maxentius, when he gained power at Rome, ordered the persecution to stop (Eusebius, Church History 8.14.1). Eusebius reckons that the western provinces suffered for less than two years and Palestine for eight (Eusebius, Martyrs of Palestine 13.11–12). Galerius, dying, issued an edict of toleration in 311 (Lactantius, Deaths of the Persecutors 34–35); see Galerius Grants Toleration.

The narrative comes from two Christian writers, Lactantius and Eusebius, who lived through these years and wrote as advocates. The record from Cirta was made by the officials who carried the edict out.