Pliny the Younger to Trajan, Letters 10.96 (Pliny the Younger, governor of Bithynia-Pontus, c. AD 112). A provincial governor writing to the emperor for instructions on how to try Christians, and describing what he had learned of them under interrogation: they met before dawn on a fixed day, sang to Christ as to a god, and bound themselves by oath not to theft, fraud or adultery. It is the earliest description of Christian worship by an outsider, and it comes with Trajan's reply (10.97) setting policy: they are not to be hunted out, but anonymous accusations have no place in the courts.