Antioch, is taken to Rome during this reign to be killed by wild beasts in the Coliseum.
Hadrian (a.d. 117–138), the "grand monarch" who made it his pride to beautify the cities of his empire with magnificent buildings while he lived in splendour and luxury, had none of the rigour of the stern soldier Trajan, and he does not appear to have taken any part himself in the persecution of Christians. Yet there were instances of martyrdom even under his easy rule; and the insurrection of the Jews stirred up by Bar Cochbar (a.d. 131) led to great slaughter of Christians wherever their old enemies got the upper hand of the Roman Government. This demolished the last remnant of confusion between Christianity and Judaism in the official mind.
Formerly it was customary to regard the reign of the just, conscientious emperor Antoninus Pius (a.d. 138–161) as free from the stain of persecution; but that agreeable delusion had to be abandoned a few years ago, when the date of the martyrdom of Polycarp, the aged bishop of Smyrna and teacher of Ignatius, was ascertained to fall within this reign (a.d. 155 or 156). Still, it was a local affair, largely instigated by Jewish animosity, with which the emperor was not directly concerned. His successor, the gentle Marcus Aurelius, saint and philosopher (a.d. 161–180), must be held responsible for the savage persecution of the Christians at Lyons and Vienne—so graphically described in the letter from those Churches to their brethren in Asia Minor—since he had been consulted by the local authorities.[1] His own reference to the Christians shows that he regarded them as obstinate, self-advertising fanatics whose folly was a menace to public order. Marcus Aurelius went beyond Trajan both in directly instigating persecution and in reviving the odious practice of employing informers. According to Melito of Sardis, the persecution spread to Asia Minor,[2] and from Athenagoras we should conclude that it extended over a wide area.[3] This is the period of the early apologists,
