Roman imperial history

Caillan Davenport y Christopher Mallan han editado un libro necesario sobre Dión Casio en el que las diferentes aportaciones de los investigadores participantes proporcionan un relato integrador y coherente sobre un autor que, al parecer, está de moda a juzgar por los diversos estudios recientes sobre su figura y su obra.

The references to the cult of Vesta included in numerous excerpts of Seneca the Elder’s collection of Controversiae offer a proof of the technical competence of declaimers in recalling the conditions prescribed by pontifical law for being admitted and kept in this priesthood, of which we are informed by the antiquarian tradition. Furthermore, these passages, which also show the importance recognized from an ethical viewpoint to values such as castitas and pudicitia in the time of Augustus and Tiberius, can be interpreted in light of some special episodes and dispositions stated by the historiographical tradition which reveal their interest in promoting and consolidating the cult of the Goddess Vesta protector of Rome’s Empire. Beyond the scholastic practice, the same interest is equally shared in the literary sphere by Seneca the Elder, as we can understand from the quotations within his work of excerpts from Controversiae dealing with Vestals

The paper focuses on Tacitus’ account of the speech made by Claudius in 48 CE in favour of the admission of the primores of ‘long-haired’ Gaul to the senate, examining arguments used by the historian to clarify the reactions to their request and the reasoning adopted by the emperor to convince the senators to accept it. Besides expressing awareness of the efficacy of the criteria used by Romans to create a supranational imperial order, the passage shows Tacitus’ ability to highlight the political meaningfulness of Claudius’ intervention, making it a model worthy of surviving and being mentioned many centuries later in modern culture. In this vein, the second part of the paper analyzes some 16th and early 17th century references to the emperor’s speech in authors such as Justus Lipsius, Scipione Ammirato, Jean Bodin, Traiano Boccalini, Hugo Grotius. Within their works, also dedicated to examining the birth, development and decline of States, we see that besides recalling an episode occurring many centuries before, some key-intellectuals made utilized the story into a valid exemplum to promote a model of efficacious government favouring integration as a means of consolidating modern states.

Desde que se iniciaron los estudios cliométricos, el interés por encontrar fórmulas y modelos que nos ayuden a entender la historia, particularmente la historia económica y social, han atraído la atención de muchos investigadores. Desde nuestra perspectiva, hemos prestado particular atención al estudio de datos concretos, pues nos hemos centrado en el estudio de las ánforas que contuvieron alimentos, sobre todo vino, aceite y conservas de pescado y su epigrafía y, a través de ellas, estudiar la dirección de los intercambios entre las diversas regiones del imperio romano y el papel que el estado jugó en dichas relaciones, en última instancia, la relación entre política y economía. En las últimas décadas, en relación directa con el progreso de los estudios sobre tipologías cerámicas, se ha avanzado notablemente en el desarrollo de los procedimientos de cuantificación. Este interés se integra en una preocupación más amplia por la cultura material romana, en particular las vajillas y los contenedores de alimentos, como instrumento para profundizar en el conocimiento de las formas de producción, distribución y consumo de productos manufacturados y de alimentos líquidos o semilíquidos que tuvieron gran importancia en la dieta romana. Así mismo, y gracias a un mejor conocimiento arqueológico de ciertas regiones del Mediterráneo, la cuantificación se ha convertido en una herramienta fundamental en la construcción de modelos explicativos sobre la producción agrícola y artesanal, y sobre las estructuras de distribución y consumo. El objetivo último es mejorar el conocimiento de la organización y dinámicas de la economía romana y proponer, en consecuencia, un marco interpretativo para definir la naturaleza de la misma.

Chapter 2 discusses the survivors of the Civil Wars, many of whom actively or reluctantly joined the regime to seek honour and wealth under the new faction that controlled Rome (an oligarchy, not a monarchy).  Eventually Agrippa's powers and honours rose so far above the rest that he became Augustus's partner in power, but only after he made a show by his conspicuous withdrawal to Miletus in 23.  The regime nearly collapsed without him.  Many other magnates rose to prominence and enjoyed favour in the 20s, although a few recalcitrants ostentatiously abstained from joining the regime, expecting it to collapse and their purity to win them popular acclaim in the post-Caesarian Republic.  Statilius Taurus, Lucius Arruntius, Messalla Corvinus, and Sallust the Younger exercised great power and held distinction, among others.

Plinius der Jüngere (61/62-113 n. Chr.) verlieh als senatorischer homo novus durch die Epistulae, den Panegyricus sowie einige Inschriften seiner aristokratischen Existenz dauerhaften Ausdruck. Diese literarischen und epigraphischen Zeugnisse ermöglichen aber nicht nur tiefgehende Einblicke in die sozialen, politischen und kulturellen Entwicklungen seiner Zeit. Sie belegen zugleich Plinius’ Bestreben, die eigene Person als in überragendem Maße wert- und normerfüllend zu präsentieren, um auf diese Weise sowohl soziopolitische Anerkennung als auch den eigenen Tod überdauernde memoria zu erlangen.

Insbesondere in seinen Briefen thematisiert Plinius dabei zahlreiche Bestandteile eines idealen aristokratischen Lebensentwurfes. Ihre systematische Auswertung ermöglicht es, die konstituierenden Betätigungs- und Bewährungsfelder der römischen Aristokratie zu identifizieren sowie die Werte, Normen und Handlungsmaximen zu bestimmen, nach denen Plinius wie auch seine Standesgenossen ihr Leben ausrichteten – oder doch ausrichten sollten.

Der zeitgenössische Diskurs über den idealen Aristokraten in der Kaiserzeit und dessen Habitus gewinnt in der vorliegenden Studie schärferes Profil.

Drawing on Mikhail Bakhtin’s theory of double-voicedness and James Scott’s theory of public and hidden transcripts, this essay investigates the colonial context of Romans 13:1–7 with particular attention to the Roman imperial cult. It is my contention that Paul attempts to persuade the audience to resist the imperial cult, whilst negotiating colonial power and authority. It is assumed that colonial discourse is, by nature, a double-voiced discourse in that the public transcript of the dominant and the hidden transcript of the suppressed coexist in a continued state of internal tension and conflict. Seen in this light, Paul as a colonised subject parodies the public transcript of the elites in his own hidden transcript. However, Paul’s doubled-voiced discourse finally turns out to be subversive against the dominant culture by suggesting that ultimate honour, fear, and authority should not be due to the rulers of the Roman Empire but to God.

Among the ancients, the regular representation of the built environment on coins was a purely Roman phenomenon.  In the Greek world, architectural representation on coinage was very uncommon; when it did appear it referred directly in some way to the local identity of the issuing state.  Coins of the Persian satrapies only rarely depicted fortifications in conjunction with traditional Persian emblems of royalty and power and temples of the chief deities in the minting city.  The Roman use of the iconography of building was fundamentally different.  From the first occurrence in 135 BC through the late Roman Empire, the architectural image on coins from Rome commemorated or politicized the monument in question.  By the mid-first century BC and into the Imperial period, architecture was commonplace in the repertoire of Roman coin iconography.

The subject of the representation of monuments is one of the most beloved (and belabored) topics in studies of Roman coin iconography.  It is also a theme in dire need of re-exploration.  Appealing to numismatists, archaeologists, topographers and art or architectural historians, architectural representations on Roman coins have been appreciated and studied primarily for the evidence they yield for the appearance or reconstruction of lost monuments. While numismatic representations may provide some evidence for the reconstruction or historical study of Roman monuments, there are a number of methodological problems.  This traditional and often uncritical approach to architectural representations has often treated the images as ‘snapshots’ or ‘blueprints’ of lost monuments, although creating wholly accurate representations of buildings – if the building even existed at the time that the coin was minted – was not the goal of the die engravers or the issuing authorities.  And less frequently have architectural representations been understood in the context of a moneyer’s or an emperor’s wider ideological or visual program as deployed on the coinage.  As a consequence, the actual phenomenon of architectural representation on Roman coinage has been inadequately studied in favor of more myopic considerations. 

Why was Rome the only ancient civilization that habitually depicted built monuments on its coinage?  Why did Greek urban centers with marble-clad monuments and politically charged building programs feature their great monuments on coins only after Roman domination?  What social and cultural developments prompted Roman moneyers in the late second and first centuries BC to depict buildings on coins for the first time?  What circumstances led to the decreasing frequency of architectural coin types in the third and fourth centuries AD until they ultimately disappeared from the Roman coinage in the fifth century?  And why were these late Roman depictions more symbolic in their lack of reference to specific constructions?  These are questions to be explored.  This book departs from the treatment of the images as sources for the appearance of ancient monuments and explores instead the historical, art historical, social, and cultural contexts of the iconography of building on Roman coins as it developed and evolved from its emergence in the late second century BC to its disappearance from the Roman coinage in the fifth century AD.

https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/oso/9780190901400.001.0001/oso-9780190901400-chapter-20

The Senate under Augustus was a strikingly different institution from the one we know from Cicero. It became one of the pillars of the regime, allowing Augustus to lay claim to a rhetoric of continuity and legitimacy he could not have achieved in any other way. But there was a fundamental change in the way senators themselves saw their role, and the relationship Rome's political, economic, and social elite had to senatorhood more broadly. The Senate itself became largely cooperative rather than competitive, and developed a new corporate personality. This shift fed into many of Augustus' own goals, but it also represented a rational response by the senators to their new reality.

The emperor Caracalla emerges from our sources as an archetypal ‘bad’ emperor. Our primary sources for the period construct an image of a volatile despot: militaristic, anti-senatorial, financially profligate and prone to fantasy. However entertaining this image is, though, it remains an obstacle to any objective assessment of Caracalla’s reign. Indeed, many have allowed the emperor’s actions to be viewed as those of an unhinged tyrant, rather than a ruler attuned to the Realpolitik of his contemporary context.

Despite an increasing number of publications advocating a more balanced view of his reign, continued acceptance of Caracallan inadequacy can be observed in connection with his introduction of the constitutio Antoniniana: ‘a decision that has never been plausibly explained on practical grounds, but Caracalla was a shocking megalomaniac and the sheer grandiosity of the gesture may be explanation enough’.  This paper offers a more considered assessment of Caracalla and his edict. Rather than an exercise in vanity, the Antonine Constitution should be viewed as a legislative response to a crisis in which the emperor’s position was vulnerable, his legitimacy debatable.

That emperors would seek mass popularity to bolster their position is undeniable. This paper argues, however, that we must look beyond the bread and circuses mentality: Caracalla’s constitutio represents, in one respect, an attempt by the emperor to forge a lasting and personal connection between himself and his populace via a de facto patron-client relationship. The final section of this paper will consider the implications of this initiative for subsequent emperors. Against this backdrop, the figure of Julian stands out as an emperor who followed a Caracallan precedent, in his case using religious reform, rather than constitutional, to consolidate his reign at the point when it might have seemed in most doubt.

An examination of the early career of the Emperor Domitian, younger son of Vespasian. This is a recent revision of a research paper first written in my Honours' year. Brian Jones, whose works are cited herein, was my supervisor for this work. Roman Imperial History. Roman History. Historiography. Prosopography. Epigraphy. Numismatics.

La collegiata di S. Maria Assunta di Otricoli e le sue collezioni d’arte sono state oggetto, a partire dalle indagini archeologiche e dai restauri svolti all’interno della chiesa ormai più di mezzo secolo fa, di una costante attenzione da parte degli studiosi. Le numerose ricerche hanno apportato un notevole contributo alla conoscenza di uno dei monumenti architettonici più rappresentativi dell’Italia centrale per quanto attiene l’Alto Medioevo, anche se, in relazione all’analisi e all’interpretazione delle numerose fasi costruttive che hanno interessato le strutture dell’edificio nel corso della sua storia secolare, sono emersi fra gli storici pareri tutt’altro che univoci.
I recenti interventi di scavo nel sotterraneo della collegiata, inoltre, dove sono venuti alla luce i resti di una possente muratura in opera quadrata, pertinente probabilmente al podio di un tempio pagano, risalente alla fase preromana del sito, hanno ulteriormente accresciuto la serie di dati materiali disponibili da analizzare, rendendo di conseguenza ancora più articolato il contesto storico di riferimento, che si è dovuto estendere a considerare l’intera evoluzione dell’insediamento urbano del municipio romano di Ocriculum, la cui fondazione da parte delle popolazioni umbre risale all’VIII secolo a.C.
In ragione proprio di tale esteso e problematico quadro critico, questo lavoro si pone l’obiettivo di affrontare, attraverso aggiornati percorsi di indagine, che hanno preso avvio con lo spoglio sistematico della documentazione d’archivio relativa ai restauri e agli scavi, conservata presso la Soprintendenza Archeologica, Belle Arti e Paesaggio dell’Umbria e l’Archivio di Stato di Perugia, e proseguiti, poi, con un accurato rilievo laser-scanner dell’intero complesso monumentale, tutte le principali questioni ancora oggetto di discussione sulla storia architettonica dell’edificio religioso, e proporre per queste nuove possibili chiavi di lettura.

The article examines the life and career of Petronius’ character Trimalchio within the dynamics of centre-periphery interaction in the Roman world of the early Imperial period. Three possible viewing angles are identified, in which the dialogue between centre and periphery takes place. First, the geographical scope, with the distinction between Italy and the provinces. Second, the ideological world of Roman citizens as opposed to the values embraced by people of different origin and culture. Third, the social and juridical workings of Roman law, which, through the progressive extension of citizenship rights, aims at the gradual integration of the peripheries of the Empire and their people into the Roman world.

Die Frage was in Polybios Historien der Grund für Roms Aufstieg zum Imperium war, die Τύχη oder die αἰτία soll hier erarbeitet werden. Dabei soll herausgestellt werden, dass Tyche zwar nach Polybios eine bedeutende Rolle zukommt, Polybios aber doch die αἰτία als Hauptgrund für den Aufstieg Roms sieht. Da die αἰτία jedoch grundsätzlich etwas ist, dass erklärbar und aufzeigbar ist, gilt es auch diese zu finden. Dabei wird die im VI. Buch angesprochene Verfassung als Hauptursache genommen, wobei hier allerdings nicht das Hauptaugenmerk auf der viel bearbeiteten Mischverfassung Roms liegen soll, sondern der wenig beachteten Militärverfassung die sich ersterer anschließt.

Experts have recently reported false bronze nummi with large reverse monograms of late Roman Imperial and Ostrogothic leaders. The experts include Alain Gennari and other members of Lamoneta.it, but not the present author. He is simply presenting this supplement to his paper “The Ricimer Monogram with Its Mysterious Additional A” and informing readers about the likelihood of spurious pieces thought to be of modern Serbian origin. His previous paper presented two Ricimer pieces, and here he presents two pieces with monograms interpreted as Eraric’s by some sources, but as mere fantasies by others. Some disagreement regarding authenticity appears to remain among some  experts and dealers.

Настоящая книга представляет собой пятый том монументального труда великого русского филолога Ф. Ф. Зелинского «История античных религий». Если два первых тома были известны русскому читателю по изданиям начала XX века и переизданиям в постсоветский период, то третий, четвертый и пятый тома впервые переведены нами с польского языка, на котором были написаны остальные тома, создававшиеся ученым в 1920–1940-х годах в Польше и Германии.

This paper reconsiders the political facets and purposes of Caracalla’s imitatio Alexandri and esteem for Sulla. Both emulations represented the result of a well-pondered political way of thinking and acting. On the one hand, Caracalla reclaimed the exemplum Sullanum displayed by his father, and sought to lead fruitfully the edgy relationships with the Roman political class also through the political role-model embodied by Sulla; on the other hand, by activating the cultural and historical heritage of Alexander in the hellenophone and Near Eastern provinces, the Emperor aimed to interact effectively with the local communities, elites, and populations.

This chapter explores slavery’s often unseen contributions to imperial Roman literary representations of elite men’s voluntary solitude at their villas, chiefly examining the villa-tours of Pollius Felix (Stat. Silv. 2.2) and Pliny the Younger (Ep. 2.17). The chapter argues that whether it is distanced, elided or displaced within the villa landscape, slavery helps define and facilitate the villa owner’s solitude. Even when it seems to disappear from or blend into the solitary landscape, slavery helps maintain the all-important sense of freedom and independence that he enjoys there, at the margins of a hierarchical society that threatened to render him figuratively servile. Thus, even as these accounts seek to accrue social distinction for their protagonists within Rome’s social hierarchies by lending them a solitary, independent pose ostensibly external to them, from a broader perspective, they reproduce these same hierarchies and reveal how far from external or marginal these men were to Roman society’s structures of power.

A lo largo de sus tres siglos de historia en la época imperial romana, la función principal de la Guardia Pretoriana fue la protección de la figura del emperador allí donde este se encontrara, ya fuera actuando permanentemente como su escolta y guardia personal  en el palacio imperial o como última línea de defensa en el ámbito militar. Pero como cuerpo de élite del ejército romano acantonado en la capital del Imperio también se les encomendó el mantenimiento y, en su caso, restablecimiento del orden allí donde fuera necesario. Así, la Guardia Pretoriana se conformaría como una de las piezas clave en la historia imperial romana como uno de los actores principales no solo a nivel militar sino también a nivel político, papel este último muy alejado de las funciones iniciales para las que fue creada pero que poco a poco fue cobrando especial relevancia tanto por su cercanía a la figura de los sucesivos emperadores como por su acantonamiento en la capital imperial. Consciente de su poder, no fueron pocas las ocasiones en que los pretorianos utilizaron su posición e influencias para dirigir y aprovechar los habituales cambios políticos en la cúspide del poder . Pero, aun siendo menos conocida, no sería menor la importancia bélica que en los campos de batalla protagonizarían los pretorianos en numerosas ocasiones como unidad militar y que a la postre les consagraría como uno de los pilares fundamentales del régimen imperial prácticamente desde su creación, en tiempos de Augusto , hasta su desmantelamiento llevado a cabo por el emperador Majencio.
Como cuerpo de élite del ejército, reconocidos como los mejor entrenados y preparados como demostraron en no pocas ocasiones, y en base a su especial misión recibían una paga superior al del resto de soldados; y su tiempo de servicio era varios años menor, por lo que resultaban ser la envidia del resto de unidades militares y en particular de aquellos que servían en el limes del imperio . Es por ello que trataremos aquí de realizar un estudio esquemático sobre su formación, estructura, actuaciones, etc. con el fin de ahondar en el conocimiento de esta institución muchas veces denostada por algunas de sus intervenciones.