At a time when scholarly interest in Constantine i has arguably reached its zenith, with the appearance in recent years of a spate of publications capitalising on the 1,700-year anniversary of his victory over Maxentius at the Milvian Bridge, Richard Flower's new study heralds a welcome volte-face in Constantinian studies. Flower's book provides the first comprehensive examination of patristic responses to Constantius ii, the middle son of Constantine by his ill-fated wife, Fausta. In this regard, Flower's study is not an imperial biography of Constantius ii, nor is it really an examination of imperial-ecclesiastical relations in the fourth century. Instead it offers a uniquely framed analysis of how early Christian polemicists challenged the use (or indeed misuse) of imperial power during the mid-fourth century, and specifically how those of the ‘Nicene’ persuasion responded to Constantius ii and his apparent support for an ‘Arian’ settlement to the Christological controversies of the period from Constantine's demise in ad 337 to the death of Constantius ii in ad 361. This is a rich yet neglected period of later Roman history, unfairly characterised as a time of divisive theological struggles, but which – as Flower's study demonstrates admirably – was a period which inspired the production of numerous theological and literary monuments.

The focus for Emperors and bishops lies in tracing the Christian appropriation and adaptation of invective literature as one of the principal ways in which Nicene opponents expressed their contempt for Constantius, his court and the bishops of the eastern Church. Invective as a literary form – the methodical defaming of an opponent according to conventions set forth by epideictic tradition (pp. 49–55) – may appear guileless, yet it frequently produced some of the most innovative expressions of dissenting literature in the late antique period, for example in polemic and heresiology. The authors analysed by Flowers were among the best invectivists of their generation, united in their opposition to Constantius ii (although not always allied in their specific complaints). Athanasius of Alexandria's Historia Arianorum, Hilary of Poitier's In Constantium, and Lucifer of Cagliari's Moriundum esse pro dei filio are the main works in Flower's discussion. Flower argues that the imaginative denunciations of Constantius by all three authors marked the Christianising of rhetorical tradition, resulting in a specifically Christian form of invective posited on a new understanding of imperial authority: ‘[Athanasius, Hilary and Lucifer] argued for a new Christian ideal for the actions of an emperor, prioritising orthodox belief and proper reverence towards the priests of the “true” Church above all other virtues' (p. 18). For all three authors, Constantius came up short on both counts: in so doing, he is shown to have impugned his own imperial legitimacy by severing the dynastic link with his pious (and orthodox) father – thereby demonstrating an expedient reimaging of Constantine, according to which the son was transformed into the tyrannus and heretic-emperor of posterity.

The study comprises an introduction, four substantial chapters, an epilogue and five appendices containing English translations of sources discussed in the main body of the book (including valuable translations of letters by Eusebius of Vercelli, and Hilary's Contra Auxentium). The introduction anticipates the book's principal themes, including the way in which our trio of authors fashioned a self-conscious literary (Christian) culture that was critical of imperial authority, drawing on models of dissent from the Christian and biblical past, but which also enabled those same authors to promote themselves as theological authorities for their own time. Chapter i (‘Praise and blame in the Roman world’) supplies background considerations relating to the role of rhetoric – specifically the twin poles of panegyric (praise) and invective (blame) – in imperial ceremony and ideology. It traces the use of rhetorical forms by Christian authors, for example Tertullian, Lactantius and Eusebius of Caesarea, the last of whom, in his presentation of Constantine, transformed the practice of imperial panegyric by his supplanting of the cardinal virtues used to gauge the good ruler with the virtue of piety. The emperor became someone worthy of praise because he lived ‘a pious and religious life in accordance with divine commands’ (p. 70). Chapter ii (‘Constructing a Christian tyrant’) examines the immediate impact of Eusebius’ new model of imperial legitimacy, as it came to be applied to Constantius by his Christian opponents. Following the traditional themes of praise and blame, specifically the stress placed on ancestry and family as a way of establishing the credentials of a ruler, Athanasius and Hilary employed synkrisis as a means of unfavourably comparing the heretical Constantius with the orthodox Constantine. As Flower notes, Lucifer of Cagliari was different again since he condemned both father and son as sympathetic to the Arian cause. All three authors drew on past persecuting exempla, from the Bible and early Christian history, as the primary way of framing Constantius as tyrant. In spite of the dearth of surviving, ‘positive’ evaluations of Constantius, Flowers makes the important point that in their time all three authors were very much lone voices, reacting against the predictable chorus of praise accompanying a serving emperor, the remnants of which lie buried in non-Nicene, or Homoean historiography (for example Philostorgius). It is in the following chapters iii (‘Writing auto-hagiography’) and iv (‘Living up to the past’) where Flower offers his most insightful analysis. Here we find detailed and thoughtful discussions of all three authors: the treatment given to the invectives of Hilary and Lucifer will undoubtedly be the most valuable for scholars working on the period and material in hand, not least because Flowers deals with sources which tend to be neglected by English-speaking historians (especially Lucifer), with the exceptions noted by Flowers, and because Flowers meticulously maps his own analysis of their writings onto the most important trends current in late Roman and late-antique scholarship. Chapter iii builds on the concerns with biblical typology in chapter ii, and looks in particular at the way in which all three writers accommodated their own authorial personae to prior depictions of biblical prophets, Christian martyrs and confessors: what they wrote enabled them to style themselves as witnesses to theological truth, utilising the treasured civic value of parrhesia as a means of speaking out against tyranny. Chapter iv continues with the theme of typological re-enactment, and considers how Athanasius, Hilary and Lucifer mapped the actions of Constantius and the Arians, together with their own personae and writings, onto well-known biblical stories, thereby creating a grand web of scriptural intertextuality intended to be a continuation of the ancient, scriptural narrative. All of Flower's discussion is informed by a detailed and up-to-date bibliography.

In the epilogue, Flower speculates on the seemingly anomalous nature of the invectives aimed at a living emperor: a corollary is, of course, the need for an urgent explanation for the apparent anomaly of Constantius' reign, comprising an understanding as to why Constantine's son opted for the choices he did with regard to the bishops whom he patronised, or the theological settlements that he had a hand in endorsing. Flower offers, tangentially, some clues in this regard. However, in all fairness to Flower, this is not what Emperors and bishops is about. Instead, what Flower offers is an innovative, engaging and richly informed treatment at the sharp end of theology, literature and politics in the controversial fourth century.