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Primary sources and sourcebooks:

BR160.A2 S7 1966A

James Stevenson, Creeds, Councils and Controversies:  Documents illustrating the history of the Church AD 337-461.  An extremely useful sourcebook for anything Christian.  A good way to “sample” major patristic authors (e.g. Augustine, Jerome, Basil, Chrysostom) 20 or 30 pages at a time.

KJA458.E5 1952 (oversize)

Clyde Pharr, trans.  The Theodosian Code and Novels.  Imperial legislation issued between 311 and 437, organized by subject and then chronologically within each topic area.  Book 16 deals with religious matters.

BV761.A3 C6 (3 vols.)

P.R. Coleman-Norton, ed.  Roman State and Christian Church.  Collects and translates, in chronological order, every piece of imperial legislation that has anything to do with Christians or the Christian church, from the second century to 535 AD.  Collected from a variety of sources and includes much that does not appear in the Theodosian Code.

BR200.C47 1986

J. Hillgarth, Christianity and Paganism, 350-750:  The Conversion of Western Europe.  An excellent selection of texts, dealing mainly with conversion and Christianization in the early medieval barbarian kingdoms.

BR1603.A1 M87

Herbert Musurillo, ed.  The Acts of the Christian Martyrs.  Many of the most well-known contemporary accounts of Christian martyrdom, with introduction and commentary.

BL610.A59 1987

Marvin W. Meyer ed., The Ancient Mysteries:  A Sourcebook.  Many more sources on pagan religious practice, particularly the mystery cults.

Modern Scholarship:

BL805.B74 1982

Peter R.L. Brown, Society and the Holy in Late Antiquity.  Assorted essays.  See especially “The Rise and Function of the Holy Man in Late Antiquity”, an extremely influential study.

BR162.2.F733 1984

W.H.C. Frend, The Rise of Christianity.  A massively detailed, but readable, narrative general history of Christianity and the Christian church from the time of Jesus to about AD 600.  Written for the nonspecialist, but solid.

DG311.C36 1993

Averil Cameron, The Later Roman Empire (for the fourth century)

and

DE71.C25 1993

Averil Cameron, The Mediterranean World in Late Antiquity (for the fifth and sixth centuries).  These two short books make a good comprehensive introduction to the period.  Concise chapters on military, political, administrative, social and economic, cultural and intellectual, and religious history give the basics, summarize the current state of scholarship, and suggest further reading.  Not nearly as fun to read as Brown’s World of Late Antiquity, but more organized and systematic.

BR128.G8 T76 1995 (2 vols)

Frank R. Trombley, Hellenic Religion and Christianization.  Assembles a mountain of useful and fascinating evidence (both literary and archaeological) regarding Christianization and “survival” of pagan worship in the late fourth through sixth centuries.  Long on description, short on interpretation/explanation.  Different chapters cover particular regions (Greece, Syria, Palestine, Egypt).

D57 .C2515 v.13 and v.14.

The Cambridge Ancient History, second edition.  Volumes covering the fourth through sixth centuries.  Long scholarly essays describing the current state of research on various topics.

B655.Z69A84.

Augustine through the Ages:  an Encyclopedia.  Ed. Allan Fitzgerald, Grand Rapids 1999.

BR67 .Q3 1984

Quasten’s Patrology (4 vols):  Basically a massive guide to early Christian literature.  Long chapters on significant Christian authors, both Latin and Greek; what they wrote, where to find it, what scholars have said about it.

BR128.R7L36

Robin Lane Fox, Pagans and Christians (New York 1987). The chapters on pagans and pagan religion are outstanding, and very detailed.  Chapters on early (pre-Constantine) Christianity and persecutions are also exceptional.

DG77.B73
Peter Brown, The World of Late Antiquity.

BR128.R7P34
Ramsay MacMullen and Eugene Lane eds., Paganism and
Christianity 100-425 CE:  A Sourcebook.

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