La repressione dei Baccanali come modello di Firmico Materno

In the De errore profanarum religionum Firmicus Maternus urges the Christian emperors Constant and Constantius II to repress any form of pagan idolatry by resorting to the use of force. He is inspired on the one hand by the Old Testament Law of Deuteronomy, on the other by the example of the repression of the cult of the Bacchanals, which Firmicus knows from Livy, but which he modifies in the final section to adapt it to his polemical purposes.