crimes (flagitia) associated with the name. In the meantime,
this is the line I have followed with those brought before
me on the charge of being Christians. 3.I have asked them
in person if they are Christians. I have asked the question
a second and third time of anyone who has confessed, threat-
ening them with punishments: those who persist I order to
be led away [i.e. to execution]. For, whatever the nature of
their admission, I am convinced that their stubbornness and
unshakeable obstinacy ought to be punished. 4.There were
others who were similarly insane who, because they were
Roman citizens, I entered on the list of persons to be sent
to the city [i.e. to Rome for trial].
Once I had begun to deal with this problem, as so often
happens, the charges became ever more widespread and
increasingly varied. 5.An anonymous pamphlet (libellus)
was circulated containing many names. I considered that I
should dismiss any who denied that they were or ever had
been Christians when they had repeated after me an invo-
cation to the gods and had made offerings of incense and
wine to your statue, which I had ordered to be brought in
[i.e. to the courtroom] for this purpose along with the
images of the gods, and furthermore had cursed Christ –
none of which things, it is said, those who are genuine
Christians can be induced to do.
6.Others, whose names were given to me by an informer,
said that they were Christians and then denied it; they
explained that they had been [Christians] but had ceased to
be, some of them three years previously, others several years
previously, and not a few even twenty years previously. All
of these also worshipped your statue and images of the gods
and cursed Christ. 7.They declared, however, that the sum
total of their guilt or error amounted to no more than this:
that they had met regularly before dawn on a fixed day to
chant verse amongst themselves to Christ as if to a god, and
to bind themselves by oath, not for any crime, but to engage
in neither theft, nor robbery, nor adultery, nor to commit aEARLY CHRISTIANITY AND THE ROMAN EMPIRE
212