Theban Legion - Criticism of The Account

Criticism of The Account

It should be noted at the outset that Thebaei is the proper name of one particular military unit: The existence of Legio I Maximiana, also known as Maximiana Thebaeorum is recorded in the Notitia Dignitatum.

Denis Van Berchem, of the University of Geneva, proposed that Eucherius' presentation of the legend of the Theban legion was a literary production, not based on a local tradition; by isolating its hagiographic conventions from the anachronisms of local narrative elements, he sought to demonstrate that Eucherius derived his formulas from Lactantius and Orosius and that the decimation was an anachronism: the practice of decimation had not been practiced for at least a century (see Ammianus Marcellinus for Julian's misinterpretation of decimation) and that service by Christians in the legions before Emperor Constantine I was relatively rare. David Woods, Professor of Classics at the University College Cork, alleges that the model of Maurice and the Theban Legion based on Eucherius of Lyon's letter was a complete fiction.