skopia
Christianity as a three-thousand-year argument, beginning with Greece and Israel long before Christ. MacCulloch refuses to tell it as a Western story: after eight centuries, Baghdad looked a likelier capital than Rome.
Six centuries in which a persecuted Jewish sect became the Roman state's religion. Chadwick tracks the arguments that decided what Christians believe, from Gnostic rivals through Nicaea to Gregory the Great.
Gregory, bishop of Tours, is the reason sixth-century Gaul is visible at all. He records Clovis splitting a soldier's skull over a looted vase, queens ordering assassinations, and miracles at the saints' tombs.