22 I 2026: Karl Dahm (Durham), Family Dramas in Late Antique Church Conflicts

Traditional scholarship tended to depict ecclesiastical conflicts of late antiquity as taking place on the grand and public stage of church councils, theological treatises, and imperial decrees with bishops and emperors in the leading roles. Typically, the Ecclesiastical Histories of the fifth and sixth centuries have been drawn on to provide macro-narratives for such approaches. This paper argues that permeating the Ecclesiastical Histories are traces of much smaller and more intimate venues where the negotiation of dogmatic conflicts took place. The domestic sphere of family and household provides a crucial – and underappreciated – framework for understanding the individual experiences and wider mechanisms of intra-Christian divisions.