Editing Ignatius of Antioch (section)

=== Circumstances of martyrdom ===
Ignatius was condemned to death for his faith, but instead of being executed in his home town of Antioch, the bishop was taken to Rome by a company of ten soldiers:
{{blockquote|'From Syria even unto Rome I fight with beasts, both by land and sea, both by night and day, being bound to ten leopards, I mean a band of soldiers...'|''[http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0107.htm Ignatius to the Romans]'' Chapter 5}}
Scholars consider Ignatius' transport to Rome unusual since those [[Persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire|persecuted as Christians]] would be expected to be punished locally. Stevan Davies has pointed out that "no other examples exist from the [[Flavian dynasty|Flavian age]] of any prisoners except citizens or prisoners of war being brought to Rome for execution".<ref name="davies">{{Cite journal |last=Davies |first=Stevan L. |title=The Predicament of Ignatius of Antioch |journal=[[Vigiliae Christianae]] |volume=30 |issue=3 |date=1976 |pages=175–180 |jstor=1583332 |doi=10.1163/157007276X00249}}</ref>

If Ignatius had been a Roman citizen, he could have appealed to the emperor, with the common result of execution by beheading rather than torture.<ref name="Arnold 2017 p. 38" /> However, Ignatius's letters state that he was put in chains during the journey, but it was against Roman law for a citizen to be put in bonds during an appeal to the emperor.<ref name="davies"/>{{rp|175–176}}

[[Allen Brent]] argues that Ignatius was transferred to Rome for the emperor to provide a spectacle as a victim in the [[Colosseum]]. Brent insists, contrary to some, that "it was normal practice to transport condemned criminals from the provinces in order to offer spectator sport in the Colosseum at Rome."<ref name="brent">{{Cite book |last=Brent |first=Allen |author-link=Allen Brent |title=Ignatius of Antioch - A Martyr Bishop and the Origin of Episcopacy |publisher=[[T&T Clark]] |location=New York |isbn=9780567032003 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6iTVAwAAQBAJ |date=2007 |access-date=3 July 2019 |archive-date=28 June 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240628163108/https://books.google.com/books?id=6iTVAwAAQBAJ |url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|15}}

Stevan Davies rejects this idea, reasoning that: "If Ignatius was in some way a donation by the Imperial Governor of Syria to the games at Rome, a single prisoner seems a rather miserly gift."<ref name="davies"/>{{rp|176}} Instead, Davies proposes that Ignatius may have been indicted by a legate, or representative, of the [[Roman governor|governor]] of [[Roman Syria|Syria]] while the governor was away temporarily, and sent to Rome for trial and execution. Under Roman law, only the governor of a province or the emperor himself could impose [[capital punishment]], so the legate would have faced the choice of imprisoning Ignatius in Antioch or sending him to Rome. Transporting the bishop might have avoided further agitation by the Antiochian Christians.<ref name="davies"/>{{rp|177–178}}

Christine Trevett calls Davies' suggestion "entirely hypothetical" and concludes that no fully satisfactory solution to the problem can be found: "I tend to take the bishop at his word when he says he is a condemned man. But the question remains, why is he going to Rome? The truth is that we do not know."<ref name="trevett">{{Cite journal |last=Trevett |first=Christine |title=Ignatius "To the Romans" and 1 Clement LIV–LVI |journal=[[Vigiliae Christianae]] |volume=43 |issue=1 |date=1989 |pages=35–52 |jstor=1584438 |doi=10.1163/157007289X00173}}</ref>