The council of nicea in three two five, really has almost no impact on the western half of the empire. It's very much a greek debate about, can you philosophically define the infinite ad and out of that comes this great anxtof - what are we? Who are we? So its impact was initially for constantine. He sends a letter in the year 324, a year before nicea, and he sends it to alexander of alexandria, the bishop. And they were absolutely miles apart. Out of all these bishops, only two opposed, and they're sent off into exile. As robin has said, it lays the foundations for schisms
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the form of Christianity adopted by Ostrogoths in the 4th century AD, which they learned from Roman missionaries and from their own contact with the imperial court at Constantinople. This form spread to the Vandals and the Visigoths, who took it into Roman Spain and North Africa, and the Ostrogoths brought it deeper into Italy after the fall of the western Roman empire. Meanwhile, with the Roman empire in the east now firmly committed to the Nicene Creed not the Arian, the Goths and Vandals faced conflict or conversion, as Arianism moved from an orthodox view to being a heresy that would keep followers from heaven and delay the Second Coming for all.
The image above is the ceiling mosaic of the Arian Baptistry in Ravenna, commissioned by Theodoric, ruler of the Ostrogothic Kingdom of Italy, around the end of the 5th century
With
Judith Herrin
Professor of Late Antique and Byzantine Studies, Emeritus, at King's College London
Robin Whelan
Lecturer in Mediterranean History at the University of Liverpool
And
Martin Palmer
Visiting Professor in Religion, History and Nature at the University of Winchester
Producer: Simon Tillotson