Why does this matter?
Well let's start with the general overview of the supposed succession of bishops of Rome in the period:
Anicetus 155 - 166
Soter 166 - 175
Eleuterus 175 - 189
Polycarp's death occurred during the reign of Anicetus. The conclusion of the Moscow manuscript of the Martyrdom of Polycarp says that Irenaeus was in Rome at this time. Interestingly Irenaeus mentions another event that occurred in that period which seems to have been a well known reference to his audience:
Others of them (i.e. the Carpocratians) employ outward marks, branding their disciples inside the lobe of the right ear. From among these also arose Marcellina, who came to Rome under Anicetus, and, holding these doctrines, she led multitudes astray. [Irenaeus AH i.xxv.6]
We have already argued for a number of revisions for Irenaeus' Against the Heresies. Eusebius cites evidence for a number of different versions of Irenaean texts floating around in antiquity.
It is noteworthy that Hippolytus cites from a version of Against the Heresies that does not add this reference. Could 'little Marcia' (Marcellina) here be Marcia Aurelia Ceionia Demetrias, Commodus' favorite concubine? The dates are certainly correct. Commodus was a very young Emperor. He was born 31 August 161 and ruled while he was still a teenager. Marcia must have roughly the same age as Commodus and her father was a freedman who worked in the household of Lucius Verus who came to Rome at this time.
It would make sense that Marcia was known to Irenaeus' contemporaries. Her influence over the Roman Church was massive.
Before Marcia was Commodus' mistress, she was the lover and mistress of one of his cousins, senator Ummidius Quadratus, and subsequently a wife of his servant Electus. However, in 182 CE Lucilla, the sister of Commodus, convinced Marcia to join in a plot with Quadratus to kill Commodus. The plot was discovered and both Lucilla and Quadratus were executed. Marcia managed to escape charges, and after Commodus' wife Bruttia Crispina was exiled and murdered due to adultery, Commodus chose not to marry again and took Marcia as his concubine.
Marcia was a Christian and persuaded Commodus to adopt a policy in favor of Christians, and kept close relations with Victor, Bishop of Rome. After Pope Victor gave her a list she had asked for including all of the Christians sentenced to mine works in Sardinia, she convinced Commodus to allow them to return to Rome. Despite the fact that Marcia was not Commodus' legal wife, he treated her like one and was thus greatly influenced by her. The inscription found in Anagnia testifies that the local city council decided to build a monument, commemorating particularly the restoration of baths on her account.
The point of course is that Marcia's later association with the Carpocratians is easy enough to explain. As I have noted many times already, chapters 21 until the conclusion in Book I of Against the Heresies represent a later addition. Irenaeus clearly could only have written a disparaging account of Commodus' mistress after their execution. It is well known that Marcia was hated in the period that immediately followed the close of the Commodian period.
Yet notice that her influence over the Roman Church lived on when one of those Christians she managed to release from the mines - Callixtus - became bishop of Rome (217 - 223 CE).
There can be no doubt that Irenaeus would have known Marcia. He identifies himself as being part of a elite circle of advisors to the Emperor Commodus. Yet notice the influence of the Christian eunuch Hyacinthus over Marcia. Her connection to castrati at least suggests contact with the Alexandrian tradition. I have also suggested the possibility that Bishop Demetrius of Alexandria.
I wonder if all of this helps suggest that Christianity was being reshaped away from its Alexandrian roots to the Roman see under the influence of Caesar himself? More on that in my next post ...
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