The Early Centuries - Byzantium 01 by John Julius Norwich Page B

archbishop seems to have realized as much. In the previous year, when a similar exercise had been proposed at Caesarea, he had categorically refused to attend and the idea had been abandoned; on this occasion, however, he resolved to face his enemies and duly presented himself before the tribunal. He was soon to regret his decision. All the old charges were now revived, and new ones introduced; hosts of new witnesses were called, each one apparently prepared to swear black and blue that the archbishop had broken every commandment and committed every crime in the statute book. He himself fought back with characteristic vigour, not hesitating to meet his accusers with their own weapons; and the synod soon degenerated into a general uproar of lie and counter-lie, of calumny and curse, insult and invective. Finally a commission of inquiry was appointed, consisting of six of Athanasius's most implacable opponents, with orders to proceed forthwith to Egypt, there to gather further evidence. At this point the archbishop, believing - probably rightly - that his life was in danger, slipped away to Constantinople. He was deposed in his absence, after which the synod broke up and its members continued their journey to Jerusalem.
    Once arrived in the capital, Athanasius went straight to the Palace, but was refused an audience; and we have it on Constantine's own authority that, one day when he was riding into the city, the archbishop suddenly appeared in his path and flung himself in front of his horse. 'He and his companions looked so weighed down by their troubles,' wrote the Emperor, 'that I felt an ineffable pity as I realized that this was Athanasius, the holy sight of whom had once been enough to draw the Gentiles themselves to the worship of the God of All.' The whole episode, we can assume, had been expertly stage-managed by Athanasius; but despite its promising beginning it did not succeed. Six bishops, including the two Eusebii, hastened to Constantinople at the Emperor's bidding, with a new and dangerously damaging allegation: that the archbishop was even now planning to call all the workers at the port of Alexandria out on strike. If he were not immediately reinstated, they would refuse to load the transports with the grain on which Constantinople depended for its survival, and the capital would be starved into submission. In vain did Athanasius deny the charges; where his beloved city was concerned, Constantine was deaf to the voice of reason. In a rage, he banished the still protesting archbishop to Augusta Treverorum - the modern Trier - and then turned back to the interrupted task of getting Arius reaccepted in Alexandria.
    Now, however, it was the Emperor's turn to fail. Every attempt by Arius to return brought new outbreaks of rioting in the city - led by the great St Anthony himself, aged eighty-six, who had left his desert hermitage to champion the cause of orthodoxy and who now wrote several personal letters to the Emperor on behalf of Athanasius. Although these were written in Coptic - Anthony spoke no Greek - they seem to have had some effect, inducing Constantine, probably some time in 336, to summon Arius back to Constantinople for a further investigation of his beliefs. It was during this last inquiry - so Athanasius later wrote, with considerable Schadenfreude, to his Egyptian flock - and while the pro-Arian bishops were trying to persuade the Patriarch of Constantinople to allow him to attend Mass on the following day (a Sunday), that
    Arius, made bold by the protection of his followers, engaged in light-hearted and foolish conversation, until he was suddenly compelled by a call of nature to retire; and immediately, as it is written, 'falling headlong, he burst asunder in the midst and gave up the ghost' . . .
    This story, to be sure, comes from the pen of Arius's arch-enemy; but 1 Acts. I. 18. although there are - predictably - several different versions of exactly what occurred,1 the unattractive