Archaeological Institute of America

Sapor I and the Apollo of Bryaxis

Author(s): Arthur Darby Nock
Source: American Journal of Archaeology, Vol. 66, No. 3 (Jul., 1962), pp. 307-310
Published by: Archaeological Institute of America
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/501461
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 Sapor I and the Apollo of Bryaxis
ARTHUR DARBY NOCK

This paper owes much to the

friendly aid of Zeph Stewart.

I. The disastrous fire of 362 in Apollo's temple In (b) and in most of the other fragments of the
at Daphne left only the walls and most of the col- speech Apollo is primarily not the remote and nor-
umns standing. Libanius poured forth his feelings mally invisible god of Olympus but the Apollo
in a Monodia of which we have such fragments of Bryaxis at Daphne, described by Libanius "in
as are quoted in a discourse of unknown authorship glowing terms," to quote Gisela Richter, Sculpture
preserved among the writings of St. John Chrys- and Sculptors of the Greeks (1950) 283. I would
ostom1: hereafter this is called Chrys. We shall be urge that in (a) also Libanius is thinking of the
concerned with two of them (6o.2f:4,312f ed. Foers- statue. It is not that he is to be supposed to have
ter). shared such widespread naif thinking as is ridiculed
in Lucian's Philopseudes, but that, as O. Weinreich
(a) The king of the Persians(i.e. SaporI), the an-
cestor of the king who is now at war with us puts it (Antike Heilungswunder [1909] 145) "Man
(i.e. Sapor II), took the city (Antioch) thanks sprach von dem Gotte, meinte aber sein Bild." Very
to treasonand burnedit. He proceededto Daph- often indeed the Greeks meant the image when
ne, to burn that also, but the god effected a they spoke of the god-and yet they did not have
change in him and the king threw his torch to be philosophers to know the difference.4 After
away and prostratedhimself before Apollo. To
such an extent did the sight of the god soften all, the whole poetic tradition, which shaped men's
him and bring him to amity (oirvTw arTO?~KaTc- thinking, ascribed to the gods in general unlimited
TE Kat &qua$e cavdl).
7trpvviiev mobility: they had images and they had favorite
(b) He that led an armyagainstus thought it better seats on earth, but they were in no sense bound to
for himselfthat the temple shouldbe preserved,2
them. In this very speech Libanius, looking back
and the beauty of the image got the better of
barbaricpassion. to the decades preceding Julian's accession, com-
The quotation of (a) breaks off abruptly. Now plains (5).
4atvo/oat is often used to describe such self-mani- So Apollo, while youraltarswere thirstyfor blood,
festations as Homeric deities made to heroes: it is you remained a faithful guardian of Daphne, and
then commonly, but not always, accompanied by a you endured neglect and even insultsof a kind and
the whittling away of your external honors. Now,
dative indicating the person or persons who witness after (the sacrificingof) many sheepand many oxen,
the manifestation. The belief that divinities showed you, who have receivedthe king's holy5lips on your
themselves to men, in waking as in sleeping hours, foot," you who have seen him whom you foretold
is common throughout Greek antiquity.3 Yet I do and have been seen by him whom you made known,
not think that what Libanius here wished to con- you who have been freed of having a bad neighbor
(there was a corpse near you that troubledyou),7
vey to his hearers and readers was the idea that you have leapt away from the midst of your stew-
Apollo had thus manifested himself to Sapor. ardship.8
1 PG 50.533ff: cf. Glanville Downey, History of Antioch in 6 Cf. Apul. Met. I1.24.7 facie mea diu detersis vestigiis eius
Syria (1961) 307 n. 142. (sc. Isidis); Heliodor. 7.8 ro~s56 t•Xvet s 70o) &c'•XaTros.
2 Cf. 30.6(3,90F.), on Constantine, "thinking it better for rpo•b9
For the kissing of feet as an act of homage or devotion cf. C.
him to believe in a different god." Sittl, Die Gebdrden(I89o) 169f; J. A. Wilson in The Intellectual
3 Cf. Fr.
Pfister, RE Supp. IV, 277ff; E. Pax, RAC V, 832ff; Adventure of Ancient Man (1946) 76; Fronto, vol. I p. 208;
Nock, HTR 27 (I934) 53ff, and Gnomon 29 (I957) 229f; 33 Haines, p. 68 Van den Hout (infant daughter of Marcus).
7 The reference is to the remains of St. Babylas.
(I96I) 585f.
4 Cf. in general V. Miiller, RE Supp. V 473ff; Edwyn Be- 8 So, in lamenting Julian's death, Libanius (I7.4; 2 p. 2o8F)
van, Holy Images (1940); M. P. Nilsson, GGR 2 (ed. 2) 526f; asks whether all the gods had abandoned their watch over
Nock, JRS 49 (I959) 6. him, richly though he had earned it; cf. 30.41(3,109). For
5 Read aro6/a 8aarXwos Saovwas in the three basic editions reproaches, sometimes violent, to the gods by those bereaved,
of Chrysostom: 8tov, is omitted by Foerster (perhaps a unique etc. cf. JRS 30 (1940)
194f.
oversight in his splendid edition).

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308 ARTHUR DARBY NOCK
Julian himself, a little later, in his pagan encycli-
cal (Ep. 89 Bidez; p. 293Aff) set forth the value
of images. They are to be venerated as though one
saw the gods in person and they are to be thought
of neither as stone or wood nor as the gods them-
selves; further (295A), "let no one therefore dis-
believe in the gods because he sees and hears that
certain persons have committed wanton outrages
on their images and temples."' As for the Daphne
incident, Julian wrote bitterly to the Antiochenes
about the indifference of the local senate
(36IB-C)
and expressed his opinion that the god had left the
shrine before the fire: the image, he solemnly as-
severates, had given him a sign of this when he
first entered.10Their neglect had, he implies, made
them unworthy of Apollo's care (363A-C), and
Apollo could be said to leave the temple just as
the gods were said to leave cities which were about
to be captured. So after Julian's death Libanius
wrote (I7.30;2,28 F.), "This then was the mean-
ing of the destruction by fire of Apollo's temple;
the god left earth, which was about to be defiled."
Nevertheless, in this speech there is the phrase
"your foot," and Libanius goes on speaking of the
image as though it were the god. Thus (8) the in-
cendiary is compared with Tityos, Idas, and the
Aloadae, all of whom had attempted violence on
actual deities, and says (iof)
What in the world, indeed,did the man who made
war on you say to himself? . .. Why did he not feel
reverencefor the beauty of the god and change his
resolution?Gentlemen,I am drawn in spirit toward
the god's form. Imaginationbringsthe image before
my eyes, the gentlenessof appearance,the suppleness
of the neck in the marble, the girdle holding the
golden tunic about his chest, so that some parts fit
closely and others hang loose. What boiling passion
would not have been quieted by his whole appear-
ance? He looked like one who is singing a song. In-
deed he has been heard,they say, playing the lyre at
noonday. Happy the ears of the listener! The song
was in praise of Earth and it is to Earth, I think,
9 For the argument cf. Sallustius 18, p. 32, ed. Nock (the
emergence of unbelief should not disturb men of sense). We
may note that Julian I6IA speaks of the Cybele stone brought
to Rome as "no work of man's hands, but truly divine, not
lifeless clay, but a thing possessed of life and divine powers"
(tr. W. C. Wright).
10 So Heraiscus could distinguish "living" images from oth-
ers; cf. Nilsson 2,525 (cf. 528,537) and E. R. Dodds, Greeks
and the Irrational
(i951) 293f.
11 Cf. indeed Apul. Met. 11.20.4 velis candentibus reductis
in diversum, deae venerabilem conspectum adprecamur, also
24.7 provolutus denique ante conspectum deae; Carm. lat.
epigr. 2037 cum primum veni Montanis et numina vidi, deabus
votum vovi, ut potui posui; Baudissin, ARW 18 (1915) I89ff.
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[AJA 66
that he is pouring a libation from the golden cup,
becauseshe cleft and closed to hide the maiden (i.e.
Daphne).
After the fire (13) the Nymphs leapt from the
neighboring springs and raised a great moan and
so did Zeus who sits near at hand-and that is the
Zeus of an adjacent temple.
So again in ii.io9ff Libanius tells how Ptolemy II
was amazed ("rkayEkI) at the beauty of the Arte-
mis of Antioch and carried it off, but the goddess
"yearned for our land" and struck the king's wife
with illness: the cause being explained to her in
dreams, he returned the image. Furthermore, the
gods honored in Cyprus desired to migrate to An-
tioch and secured the aid of Delphi; so artists were
sent to make copies of the gods and they contrived
to substitute these for the originals which Antioch
thus secured. Except for the supposed wish of the
deities to migrate, and the trick of the artists, the
story recalls what we read about Damia and Au-
xesia in Herodotus
5.83ff.
Accordingly, I conclude that (a) refers to the
effect which the sight of Apollo's image made upon
Sapor." I think that this view is supported by the
comment of Chrys. (col.
563).
How was it that he who, as you say, got the better
of barbaricpassion and of so large an army and
proved able to escape peril then (and you say that
he also slew the Alcadaeand put an end to the plots
that they were devising against the gods), how was
it that he who had so much power did nothing of
the sort on this occasion?
"proved able to escape peril then" seems to me to
indicate that the crucial point was the safety of the
image, and suggests that Chrys. did not read (a)
as indicating anything distinct from (b). Further,
what he says tells also against any idea that the
statue was said to have produced some miraculous
manifestation, like the flame that issued from the
breast of Argive Hera in Herodotus 6.82-which
For the feeling suggested cf. also Liv. 5-41.8 on the effect pro-
duced on the Gauls when they saw the Elder Statesmen as they
sat awaiting death: praeter ornatum habitumque humano au-
gustiorem, maiestate etiam quam voltus gravitasque oris prae
se ferebat simillimos dis. ad eos velut simulacra versi cum sta-
rent.... For our text, note the rendering of cadv?)as "wurde
sichtbar" by J. Wackernagel, Vorlesungen ii. Syntax I (ed. 2:
Basel 1926), 202. A Syriac legend translated by H. Gollancz,
Julian the Apostate (1928) 254, tells how Julian was so moved
by the beauty of a Christian church which he had purposed
to destroy that he blessed the builder, conceived the idea of
turning it into a house of worship for his idols and did per-
form pagan mysteries within it.
1962] SAPOR I AND THE APOLLO OF BRYAXIS
was indeed an omen for Cleomenes, not a defensive
miracle."2Had Libanius proceeded to describesome-
thing of the sort, Chrys. would hardly have re-
frained from sarcasm.
Furthermore, we have to remember the more de-
tailed description of the statue as given by Philos-
torgius p. 87 Bidez, with all the gold and the great
hyakinthos eyes: he comments that the various fea-
tures harmonized into an indescribablebeauty, and
that it was so constructed as to cause very many to
be ensnared by its exceeding beauty into paying
homage to it."3
Imagine the effect of a first view, with, it may be,
the glint of bright sunshine upon it. It could well
have evoked something like the emotion portrayed
by Dion of Prusa (12.50f) when speaking of the
Zeus of Phidias at Olympia (which the Apollo of
Bryaxis equalled in size):
O finest and best of craftsmen,no one will deny
that you have made something sweet and pleasing
to behold, somethingthat is an overpoweringenjoy-
ment for the eyes of all Greeks and barbarianswho
have come here in their numberson many occasions.
In fact this would inspire reverendawe (av iKrX1-
$et) even in the unreasoning nature of animals,
could they but look upon it."
2. What, then, of Sapor's response to the god's
beauty? There are many stories of invaders being
repelled by some miracle or sign15 and several of
their being supernaturallycompelled to make resti-
tution for looting temples,"' but I have found only
two other instances of an invader, who had no
cause to make reparation, being said to have paid
a spontaneous act of homage to a deity belonging
to those whose land he had invaded.
First, there is a tale of the Persian expedition of
490, preserved in the so-called Lindian Temple
Chronicle. Datis landed on the island and besieged
12 Cf. Nilsson, GGR (ed. 2, 1955)
I 8Iff, on miracles associ-
ated with images.
13 Cf. Lucian, D. Syr. 32, on the cult-image at Hierapolis;
Plin. N.H. 36.32 on a Hecate too bright for the eyes.
14Cf. Wilamowitz, Glaube der Hellenen 2 (I932) Io4f, on
the feelings which entering the Parthenon could have evoked.
15 Cf. M. Launey, Recherches sur les armies hellinistiques
on a curious instance in Syria, IGLS
(I950) 897ff; I799ff, cf.
AJA 63 (I958) 34of. Libanius 5-41 (1,317) tells how Artemis
and Apollo routed the Scythians who invaded the territory of
the original Antioch.
16 Cf. Hdt. 6.i18 (a dream causes Datis to send back to the
Delion in Boeotia a gilded image of Apollo; it is not suggested
that he had been responsiblefor its removal).; Diod. Sic. 14.63,
7off (the Carthaginians in 396 sacked the temples of Demeter
and Kore outside Syracuse. Plague and defeat ensue, and they
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309
the inhabitants who had taken refuge in Lindus.
Shortage of water brought them near to the point
of surrender, when the goddess appeared to one of
the magistrates in his sleep and told him to be of
good cheer, since she would request of Zeus the
water that they needed. The citizens found out that
they had water for five days and asked the barbari-
ans for an armistice of that length, saying that
Athena had sent to her father for aid; if it did not
arrive within the prescribedperiod, they would sur-
render the city. Datis heard this and laughed. The
next day a great darkness arose over the Acropolis
and much rain fell in torrents over its center; so
the besieged citizens got abundance of water and
the Persians were short of it. Datis was stricken
with awe by the miracle (epiphaneia) of the god-
dess and sent his robe, circlet, bracelets,tiara, sword,
and covered carriage to be dedicated in the temple.
He then broke camp and went off, but first he
pledged friendship with the Lindians and declared
that they were protected by the gods.
We are not here concerned with the question of
what historical truth if any lies behind this story
-whether Datis did or did not give to the temple
Persian "gifts of honor."" The interesting thing
is the story itself. Datis has not threatened the
temple, let alone harmed it; he yields to Athena's
power and pays his respects to it.
Secondly, we have the legend of Alexander's
visit to Jerusalem.'8 According to this, Alexander,
while besieging Tyre, wrote to the high priest of
the Jews asking for assistance, provisions for the
army, and the gifts formerly sent as tribute to
Darius. The high priest's scruple against violating
his oath not to take arms against Darius angered
Alexander and he threatened to make an example
of him. In due course Alexander marched on
Jerusalem.The high priest, after bidding the people
set up a cult of the deities in Carthage.Cf. J. Carcopino,Aspects
mystiques [1941] x3ff); Liv. 29.8.9ff, I8.3ff, Diod.Sic. 27.4, App.
Samn. 12 (a disaster to his ships causes Pyrrhus to restore the
sacred treasures of Persephone at Locri); Cic. Div. 1. 48
(threatening dream stops Hannibal from robbing temple of
Hera Lacinia; he makes reparation); Ps. Quintil. Decl. 323
(plague causes Alexander to rebuild a temple outside Athens
which he had burned).
17 Chr. Blinkenberg, in his final edition of the text (Lindos
2. [I941] no. 2) argues (col. I92ff) in favor of the story
being based on genuine material, P. Faure, Rev. Hist. 192
(I94I) 236ff, against. On the document as a whole cf. K.
Ziegler, RE VIA, I052ff; on the story cf. Nock, Conversion
20.
(I933)
18Joseph, Al xI.3I7ff, to which Carl H. Kraeling drew my
attention.
 310 ARTHUR DARBY NOCK
pray and offering sacrifice, had a dream in which
God commanded him to adorn the city with
wreaths, open the gates and go out to meet the
Macedonians; the people were to be in white rai-
ment and the priests in their prescribed dress.
Alexander saw them, came forward alone, pros-
trated himself before the Name (on the high
priest's mitre), and greeted the high priest. Those
around Alexander were astonished and thought
him mad. Parmenio in particular asking why he
prostratedhimself before the high priest. Alexander
explained that he was in fact paying homage to
the high priest's deity; earlier, at Dium in Mace-
donia, a dream had shown him the high priest
urging him not to delay but to come over with
confidence to Asia and promising him the Persian
empire. He proceeded to sacrifice in the Temple
under the high priest's direction. (Another version
of the story, which passed into one form of Pseudo-
Callisthenes,19 makes Alexander say "Your God
shall be my God.")
3. Two years before the Monodia Libanius had
composed his Antiochikos, which includes a fervent
eulogy of the beauties of Daphne (Ii.233ff) 20 There
is indeed no mention of the image of Apollo, or
of any other image. Two instances of divine favor
to Antioch which figure in the speech have been
19
2.24: cf. Fr. Pfister, SBHeidllbb (1914) xi; R. Marcus
in the Loeb Josephus,vol. 6,512ff; H. H. Rowley, Bull. Ryl. Libr.
38 (I955) I66ff; E. Bikerman, Ann. inst. phil. hist. orient.
slaves 7 (1939-44) 32ff.
20 Cf. 94ff with the story of the wonder which indicated
to Seleucus the truth and scene of Daphne's transformation,the
serpent that showed to him that this was a haunt of Apollo,
and the oracle from Miletus commanding the consecrationof the
site. For the Antiochikos see the translation and commentary
of Downey, ProcPhilSoc 103 (i959) 652ff.
21 It should indeed be remarked that Libanius says nothing
about Diocletian's building activity in Antioch.
22 Is it conceivable that Libanius was,
consciously or uncon-
sciously, influenced by the Eleusinios of Aristides (I9, Dindorf:
22, Keil)? Aristides was writing after the destruction of the
Eleusinian sanctuary by fire during the inroad of the Costobocs,
and reviewing its glorious past. From the period of legend, he
passes to the Persian invasion and says that not only did Eleusis
remain unsacked (which is untrue: cf. Hdt. 9.65), but that
when a cloud from Eleusis lit upon the ships together with the
mystic song (ib. 8.65) Xerxes was astounded (&KcrXayeis)and
fled. He later speaks of "the sight of the torches" (al
i8-es
Cavelrat) as quenching the boldness of Sphodrias (Plut.
Ages. 24.7 does indeed quote a story that the invading troops
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[AJA 66
mentioned earlier. He tells also (59ff) how the
Persian monarchs had regarded the city with vene-
ration, even Cambyses proving a pious benefactor
and building a shrine there. The Romans, again,
had sought to move the statue of Zeus Kasios and
had desisted because of thunderbursts (116). With
reference to Sapor'sinvasion he relates only that the
Antiochenes stood their ground and did not flee
(158). If the story of Sapor's change of heart at
Daphne had been current, would he not have been
likely to include it?21
So I venture to suggest that this tale may well
be the product of the imagination of Libanius under
the shock caused to him by the destruction of this
thing of beauty which had been a glory of his
Antioch. The temple had survived the crisis of a
century earlier unscathed.22"And now," he asks
(3), immediately after quotation (b) (supra, first
page) "O Sun and Earth who or from where was
this enemy who needed neither hoplites nor cavalry
nor lightarmed troops but with a little spark de-
stroyed all?" He did not, like Julian, assert or
suggest that Christians were responsible for the
fire.23But did he not believe, d contre coeur, that
some unfilial son of Antioch had done this thing?
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
saw a light from some shrines at Eleusis and were terrified
thereby). He proceeds to describe the inviolate security of
Eleusis during all that followed, including the Celtic invasion.
He concludes with a series of apostrophes, ending with one
to the Greeks for being supine (7repteltere) when this great
evil was approaching. Libanius cannot have known Tacitus,
but the reflectionsin Hist. 3.72 on the burning of the Capitoline
temple afford a distant analogy.
23 Cf. A. J. Festugibre,Antioche paienne et chritienne
(I959)
83f. I do not indeed think that Julian's words (36IC) eTre
XaO6v'res etre p imply any uncertainty. The verb is to be taken,
not in an intransitive sense as by W. C. Wright ("whether by
accident or on purpose") but as transitive (so Duncombe)
"whether without or with connivance." P. Petit, Libanius et la
vie municipalea Antioche au IVe sikcle apres J.-C. (I955) 206f,
rightly inferred from Ep. 1376 (II,42IF) that Libanius served
on the commission which investigated the fire. The letter in-
dicates that Libanius had no doubt as to the fact of arson, while
insisting that a distinction be drawn between incendiaries and
mere bystanders. This shows the fairness and humanitarianism
that are characteristicof Libanius.
For the Christianview that the temple was struck by lightning
cf. Chrysostom, De laudibus Pauli Apostoli 4 (PG 50.489).