God and Gold in Late Antiquity by Dominic Janes (review)

308BOOK REVIEWS complex process of editing the work underwent before its publication (although the brief, introductory note by Vincenzo Fiocchi Nicolai is helpful). I salute the enterprise of the publisher and his facilitative pricing policy. Simon Ditchfield University ofYork God and Gold in LateAntiquity. By DominicJanes. (NewYork: Cambridge University Press. 1998. Pp. xii, 212; 13 b/w halftones, 1 color frontispiece.) This little book consists in five chapters. Chapter 1 is actually an introduction to the book overall; the chapter skims several subjects: public display of wealth, early Christianity and wealth,gift exchange and gift giving,the so-called jeweled style, Jewish iconophobia (presenting a view that is fifty years out of date), moral opposition to wealth and luxury, luxury commodities as social markers, power, representing God in gold, sex, symbolism. All this (and there is more!) in seventeen pages. Chapter 2.1 concerns the Roman Imperial application of luxury goods (precious metals, selected colors [notably purple] , textiles, gemstones, pearls, coins, 'precious substances,' colored marbles, gold tesserae, opus sectile, silver plate) as traditional markers of power (all clearly borrowed from Hellenistic models, although Janes does not mention this); the author lumps this omnium gatherum under the rubric "secular": a problematic if not downright misleading term, given the context. Chapter 2.2 concerns the early Christian appropriation of the materials outlined in Part l;the result, we are told, is the creation of a church built on the so-called treasure society mentality. This is without doubt a reasonable judgment. Chapter 3 is based on literary sources and attempts to explain how early Christianity managed to reconcile the evangelical call to poverty with the ecclesiastical commitment to building up the Church on the model of a treasure society. Much of this chapter focuses on Latin metaphorical and allegorical readings of the Song ofSolomon andJohn's Revelation—the time frame of this interpretative exercise (as Janes presents it) extends well beyond the Late Roman period into medieval western Europe. Chapter 4 treats iconographie issues, mosaic iconography (with particular attention to Christian appropriations of Imperial types and the use of gilded tesserae) along with an examination of the so-called golden aesthetic "from Antiquity to the Middle Ages." The author deigns to share his view ("gaudy") of the jeweled cross in the apse of Sant'Apollinare in Classe: bumpkins like the present reviewer probably will continue to admire this image despite Janes's peremptory dismissal. This concluding chapter returns to what I take to be the book's main theoretical crux, namely, how the early Christians reconciled their commitment to BOOK REVIEWS309 voluntary poverty with their church's wealth.We learn that it was important for early Christians not to exhibit a "world-denying ethos"; the author also reveals that the Church and the Empire co-existed, using "related symbolic vocabularies for different ends"—this is not exactly new information. There is a short epilogue in which the author tells us that he likes the apse mosaic in Sant'Agnese best of all because of its "clarity of symbolism." The book concludes with a valuable bibliography and a modest index. The thirteen halftones are mediocre in quality: at the very least,the mosaics deserved a color presentation.With the recent declines in the cost of good color printing, what is the excuse for offering second-rate black and white halftones? This book's theoretical framework (evangelical poverty vs. ecclesiastical wealth) is the product of the sixteenth century. I am not sure where the author stands, whether he sides with selected Reformers who rejected ecclesiastical pomp, or whether he supports the bishops and kings who built beautiful churches and exchanged stunning gifts. Frankly, the whole exercise strikes me as tired and overwrought. I doubt that there is much new to say on this subject; if there is,Janes has not said it. I would have been happier with more color illustrations of gold, more discussion of how gold was used, where and when, under what circumstances and by whom. The book does not discuss gold deposits actively worked in the late Roman period, or gold prospecting, levigation , smelting, and standards of gold purity, or the distribution networks and quantities of bullion in circulation for...