Confiscations from pagan temples

[Sejanus]

I've just joined this forum. I am constructing a database of European history from Constantine the Great to the present day,  and am making a rather dodgy entry that I would like some help on. It concerns the role of temples asd financial centres. As I understand it, Constantine started to seize the assets of temples  in 331. I've written in my notes:

" Assets were seized from temples, especially in Rome, and therefore from its citizens. Temples were the banks and exchanges of the empire, the heart of finance and the economy. Seizing their assets broke the economy, but was a bonanza for  the state. "

This may be nonsense, as I haven't read any scholarly articles on this, but would appreciate any comments, criticisms or amendments.

Thanks.

[guy]

On 12/31/2022 at 2:38 PM, Sejanus said:

As I understand it, Constantine started to seize the assets of temples  in 331. I've written in my notes:

" Assets were seized from temples, especially in Rome, and therefore from its citizens. Temples were the banks and exchanges of the empire, the heart of finance and the economy. Seizing their assets broke the economy, but was a bonanza for  the state. "

First, welcome to UNRV. (Your post probably would have been better placed in the subforum "Templum Romae - Temple of Rome.")

I think you are overestimating the power and influence of pagan temples in the late Roman Empire.

By AD 331, paganism had become an effete and less important factor in Roman government and daily life. 

You may be confusing the pagan temples' importance at the time of Constantine with that of the Delian Temple of Apollo on the ancient Greek Island Delos, which held the treasury of the Delian League until Pericles transferred it to Athens around 454 BCE.

In fact, most of these pagan temples continued to function and still had nominal power many decades after the reign of Constantine. These pagan temples, nevertheless, were not "the heart of finance and economy" of the late Roman Empire.

Edited January 2, 2023 by guy