be Éric Rebillard's stress on flexible, indeed multiple, identity (based on "internal plurality") amongst late Antique Christians, as a better way of conceiving of the various elements in concert in complex personalities, moving away from hierarchical categories and toward the different choices made among different commitments in different contexts.76. Christians and Their Many Identities in Late Antiquity, North Africa, 200-450 CE (Ithaca, 2012). For Rebillard, the crucial observation is not about judging "intensity" of conversion or loyalty, but rather about recognizing the fact "that religious affiliation was given salience only intermittently and that it had no unique relevance in determining Christians' behavior."77. Rebillard, p. 95. What seems relatively clear, in fine, is that John was a Christian—perhaps through the pressure of the times, perhaps by virtue of family tradition, perhaps with sincere conviction—but a Christian possessed of an equally sincere fascination with cross-cultural manifestations of divinity in the world, with the Neoplatonic philosophical tradition, with the historical religious practice of Romans and others, and with the history and traditions of his ancient home. His clear attraction to symbols that could be (and have been) taken to denote self-identification with pagan elements is inextricable from pride in his homeland, his paideia (cultural education), and his antiquarian project.

WORKS

As seen above in the account of John's life, the writer himself records some writings (or projected writings) that do not survive: A panegyric of Zoticus early on, as well as a panegyric of Justinian later; it is not clear whether the imperial commission of a history of a Persian war was ever completed.78. Wuensch, p. lxxvii, discusses one possible fragment, and prints another brief fragment (found in the Lexicon Seguerianum) that he believes to belong to this history, but to have been neglected by other researchers; see further Dubuisson-Schamp, 1.1: lxxviii-lxxix. John's only other known writings are the extant three works, De mensibus (On the Months),79. Gk. περὶ μηνῶν. De ostentis (On Signs),80. Gk. περὶ διοσημειῶν, that is, more specifically "sky-signs." and De magistratibus populi Romani (On the Magistracies of the Roman State).81. Or "On Powers"—different Greek titles are attested in the manuscript: περὶ ἐξουσιῶν, περὶ πολιτικῶν ἀρχῶν, and περὶ ἀρχῆς τῆς Ῥωμαίων πολιτείας. See Dubuisson-Schamp, 1.1: cxvii-cxviii for discussion. The Suda entry does not mention this work, but instead says John wrote on "some other mathematical [astrological?] subjects."