Julie van Pelt, Ghent University
This paper investigates the (largely unexplored) intersection between animals in late antique Christian literature and paradoxography, by analyzing the Life of Makarios the Roman (ed. Vassiliev). It argues that the Life uses paradoxographical marveling – a cognitive response to the world’s vastness and the limits of human understanding of it – to express the unfathomable aspects of sanctity. It also argues that the representation of animals is central to this process. The Life of Makarios is a late antique hagiography about the fantastical journey of three monks in search of the end of the world (Angelidi). Their quest leads them across pitch-dark forests and dangerous lands inhabited by terrifying creatures. They finally arrive at the world’s end and find the saint, Makarios. This Life may be regarded as a Christian paradoxography. Paradoxography emerged within ancient ethnography and travel-literature (Nichols). It reports natural wonders from faraway places, beyond the known world. It therefore relies on the audience’s imagination. Yet, paradoxography is also the product of a scientific stance, of the urge to collect knowledge and discover truths (Schepens & Delacroix; Stoneman). Thus, it – purportedly – presents readers with facts about the world that, though perhaps incredible, are nonetheless true, triggering a complex cognitive response. The Life of Makarios uses paradoxographic strategies to communicate Christian truths. The hagiographer’s familiarity with this mode is suggested by its intertextuality with the Alexander Romance. Descriptions of rare or extraordinary animals are a key-ingredient of paradoxography (Beagon). Not only do they spark our imagination, they also challenge our understanding of the world as they invite questions of what it means to be human. Also particularly suited to that purpose are monstrous races that challenge the divide between humans and animals, such as dog-headed people (kunokephaloi). Animals feature in two ways in the Life, one hazardous, one helpful: as the remote world’s wild inhabitants, and as divine agents. 1) On their journey, the monks encounter plenty of animals, from kunokephaloi and apes, over buffalos and leopards, to elephants, basilisks and unicorns. As the journey advances, the encountered races gradually become less human-like and more wondrous, suggesting a sense of alienation. 2) At the same time, two animals, a stag and a dove, guide the monks through the impassable landscape. Makarios, too, was guided to the world’s end by an ass, a stag, and a serpent. Moreover, he cohabitates with two lions. Early Christian literature often features wild animals as divine agents, with human features (Spittler; Gilhus; Cox Miller). Here, the serpent-guide speaks with a human voice (ἐλάλει ἀνθρωπίνως) and walks like a man (περιεπάτει ὡς νεανίσκος), and the lions behave like rational humans (ὡς ἄνθρωποι λογικοί). Both ways of representing animals suggest that Makarios, the saint who lives at the end of the world, is, by comparison, even farther beyond anything the audience has witnessed, not quite human not quite animal, thus surpassing the ‘human/animal-binary’ (Cox Miller), and yet, thanks to the narrative, also imaginable in his unimaginableness. Thus, the Life of Makarios uses Christianized paradoxography (including animals, semi-humans, and monsters) in order to represent the mystery of what it means to be holy.