Yale University Library Research Guides: Early Christianity and Patristics: Sourcebooks

Welcome

Sourcebooks gather selections of historical documents (primary sources). Use them to find important passages quickly.

Christianity and the Roman Empire: Background Texts by Ralph Martin Novak interweaves primary sources with a narrative text and constructs a single continuous account. sources are selected to emphasize the manner in which the government and the people of the Roman Empire perceived Christians socially and politically.
Miracles in Greco-Roman Antiquity: A Sourcebook for the Study of New Testament Miracle Stories by Wendy Cotter a collection in translation of miracle stories from the ancient world. healing, exorcism, nature and raising the dead. Online available.
Women's Religions in the Greco-Roman World: A Sourcebook by Ross Shepard Kraemer translations of primary texts relevant to women's religion in Western antiquity, from the fourth century BCE to the fifth century CE. Online available.

Church and Empire by Maria E. Doerfler et al. The history of the church's relationship with governing authorities unfolds from its beginnings at the intersection of apprehension and acceptance, collaboration and separation. This volume is dedicated to helping students chart this narrative through early Christian writings from the first six centuries. Online available.
And You Welcomed Me: A Sourcebook on Hospitality in Early Christianity by Amy G. Oden documents that describe the work of religious communities that took care of pilgrims and the sick in the late antique and early medieval world.
Dragons, Serpents, and Slayers in the Classical and Early Christian Worlds by Daniel Ogden Stories about dragons, serpents, and their slayers. new translations accompanied by commentaries that place the source-passages into their mythical, folkloric, literary, and cultural contexts. Asampling of the ancient iconography included.
Paganism and Christianity, 100-425 C. E. – A Sourcebook by Ramsay MacMullen et al. texts illuminate and bring to life the bizarre and the banal of the social world of the Roman Empire, the world in which Christianity ultimately gained preeminence. Brief introductions to the documents included.
Pagans and Christians in Late Antiquity by A. D. Lee charts the rise to dominance of Christianity in the Roman empire.

Christianity in the Later Roman Empire: A Sourcebook by David M. Gwynn explores Christianity's rise as the dominant religion of the Later Roman empire and how the Church survived the decline and fall of Roman power in the west and converted the Germanic tribes who swept into the western empire.
Christianity in Late Antiquity, 300-450 C. E. : a reader by Bart D. Ehrman incorporates standard texts--from authors such as Athanasius, Augustine, and Eusebius--in recent translations and also includes less familiar texts, in their entirety or in long excerpts. texts are arranged thematically. Online available.