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That political failure and disgrace was the consequence of persecuting Christians is a common theme in accounts written in the course and aftermath of the Great Persecution. The pattern generally went as follows: an emperor's regime prospered as long as friendly relations with the Church were maintained but deteriorated as soon as measures were taken against it, which explains why Valerian ruled for several years before his shameful defeat and death in Persian captivity and Diocletian for almost two decades before he was struck by illness.1 Materiality was an important manifestation of this failure, which had roots in both Classical and biblical traditions.2 Imperial flesh wasted or rotted away, and imperial bodies were left unburied or simply disappeared, an ironic reversal of the humiliating punishments that had been inflicted on the martyrs they created, who were remembered just as the tyrants were forgotten.
In some cases, this extended to honorific inscriptions and monuments. Probably the most vivid example of this is in book nine of Eusebius's Ecclesiastical History where, after describing how Maximinus Daia died by a wasting disease after his defeat by Licinius, the bishop goes on to report how mobs in every city violently pulled down, smashed, disfigured with paint, and mocked Maximinus's statues.3 This was originally the finale of the work, before Eusebius went on to add further material around a decade later telling the story of Constantine's victory over Licinius.4 Here Licinius too, after failing to learn from the lessons of the past, suffered the same fate as all persecuting emperors: "even their name was forgotten; their portraits and tributes were swept into merited dishonor."5 Lactantius ends his On the Deaths of the Persecutors on a similarly triumphant note with a question: where are the tetrarchic cognomina of the Iovii and Herculii now? He then answers: "God has blotted them out and erased them from the earth."6
Obviously, this is rhetorical. Like Eusebius, by telling this story Lactantius has ensured that the memories of these individuals would be preserved, though in an antithetical form from what had been intended—infamy rather than fame.7 Both writers were placing a Christian spin on long-established ideas and practices concerning how prominent individuals, generally overthrown emperors, might have...