Incestum ... et diros sacrorum ritus confingerent. Tacitus and the alleged circle of Christian aristocrats around Junia Lepida
2017
Abstract
In the paper the more than eighty years old suggestion of Henri Janne is dealt with, according to whom Junia Lepida and a circle of the members of Roman elite described by Tacitus to have stand trial with her in 65 A.D., were Christians and were also tried therefor. This suggestion seems totally neglected until yet, and rightly so for the most part, because it is not persuasive in any of the individual cases in question.
Some of Janne's particular observations, however, are noteworthy, and eventually raise the question of what sort of Christians such members - were there any at all - of the 1st century Roman elite, especially of the senatorial aristocracy, would have been.